Personal Servant
by Sakumira Agashi
Summary: Two kingdoms lived in peace until a war broke between them. It was a war, so a kingdom won and the other lost, everyone could tell that. The princess of the losing kingdom was captured, waiting for her fate to be determined by the prince of the winning kingdom, who had become the king. Instead of killing her like she expected, he ended up making her his personal servant.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1: Prolouge**

Once upon a time, there were two kingdoms close to each other. One was called Boom Kingdom, a kingdom which mostly provided explosives, such as TNT, for mining. The other one was called Redstone Kingdom, which provided Redstone for building useful machines. No matter what each kingdom specialized, both of them had friendly and talented people and would help each other whenever they could.

The two kingdoms thought that they would be able to continue in peace like this, but they were wrong. A war broke between them and millions of their people were killed. Although some survived, the number of the saved ones could not be compared to the number of the killed ones, it was like comparing an elephant to an ant. After a few years, the war finally ended with Boom Kingdom winning and taking over Redstone Kingdom. The people of Redstone Kingdom that survived were all captured, some were killed, some were enslaved and some were still in the dungeon waiting for their fate.

Although Boom Kingdom won, the king and the queen there died during the war, as well as Redstone Kingdom's. The prince of the winning kingdom had to take over his parents' throne and continued ruling his kingdom. The princess of the losing kingdom managed to survive, but was captured like her people and thrown into the dungeon.

And with that, the story of the next generation continued.

* * *

 **Hello guys, it's Sakumira, the author. When I finished making the plot for this story, I realized that it's similar to my other story "Behind the Mask" at some points. I don't know if this is a spoiler for the people who had read that story, but I said it's just at SOME POINTS, so I think it's okay for now… (maybe?) XD**

 **Anyway, this is just a prologue but… thanks for reading anyway. I'll see you in the next chapter.**

 **Bye!**


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2: First meeting**

It was a very fine morning at Boom Kingdom. The sun was shining brightly down the ground below and the wind was gently blowing, making the leaves and the grass rustle along. Birds were chirping a happy tune while the butterflies were dancing cheerfully around the colorful blooming flowers. The people were busy rebuilding their kingdom since the war just ended a few months ago, and they have already seen improvements, which was good.

At the castle, a young man was walking toward the direction of the dungeon. He was bald and had a pair of bright black eyes. He was wearing a long-sleeved green shirt with golden trims and six golden buttons along the chest, worn above it was a darker green cape with a golden button attached at his right collarbone to hold it in place. His pants were black and matched with his black shoes and short brown gloves. On top of his head was a golden crown with shiny pinkish red rubies attached to it.

When he reached the entrance, a guard standing next to it who had brown hair and yellowish green eyes bowed down.

"Good morning, Your Majesty."

The man nodded his head in return. "Aiden, you remember why I come here, don't you?"

"Of course, Your Majesty!" Aiden said and gestured his hand into the dungeon. "Please, this way."

Aiden, the guard, led him through the hallways. While the man was walking behind him, he took a look around. The prisoners from Redstone Kingdom who was behind the metals bars all looked at him when they caught sight of him passing by. Some glared at him in hate, some yelled harsh words at him and some just looked at him shortly and turned away. No matter what, he maintained a calm and straight face until they reached their destination.

"We're here, Your Majesty."

Aiden said and the man looked inside. Behind the bars, there sat a young girl at the corner of the small prison. She had short brown hair that barely touched her shoulder blades and fair skin. She was wearing an off-shoulder red dress with a golden belt wrapped around her waist. The bottom part of her dress was torn up a little and had a shorter layer of red fabric, which had golden trim and was on top of the longer one underneath. On top of her head was a golden small tiara with small rubies attached to it.

Seemed to sense their presences, she turned her gaze up from the ground, revealing her brown eyes. Seeing the man's crown, she immediately knew who he was.

"I- It's you!" She said as her body shook a little upon seeing him.

"Good morning." He said in a calm voice. "Did you sleep well last night?"

"H- how am I supposed to SLEEP, you BASTARD?!" She exclaimed angrily, but his expression didn't change on bit. "I am the princess, yet I have to sit here doing NOTHING while my people got killed and captured! My parents were killed too! You're a royal like me, then are you that STUPID not to understand how I feel?!"

"Silent!" Aiden said and pointed his sword to her. "This is King Magnus you're talking to!"

"I don't care! I'm not going to do whatever you want me to do, so just keep dreaming!"

Aiden gritted his teeth. "You little daughter of a b-"

Before he could finish, Magnus held up one hand, signaling him to stop. "That's enough arguing for now."

"B- but Your Majesty!" Aiden said while gesturing his hand at her. "She dares _insult_ you!"

"That's fine to me."

"B- but-"

Magnus glanced over him. " _Aiden_."

Seeing his king's threat, Aiden fisted his hand and sighed. "Yes, Your Highness."

"Good." Magnus said and turned back to the princess. She was glaring at him dangerously. If she was free at the moment, she would surely do every worst thing she could think of to him. But with those strong metal bars, she was left no choice but to hold it in.

They just stared at each other in silence and no one said a word to break it. The princess was fisting her hands so hard that he could see her knuckles were turning white, but he maintained his plain expression before turning back to his guard.

"Aiden, lead the way out."

"Yes, Your Majesty."

"I'll get my revenge! Just you wait and see!"

She yelled as they walked away.

* * *

"Why do thing have to be like this…?"

The princess said as she faced the wall while sitting in front of it. It had been two days since the king visited her, and she had never felt so angry in her life. She wanted to do something, something _at all,_ but all she could do right now was to sit here and waited for her fate to come.

Suddenly, she heard the clanking sound of the metal bars and turned her head back. There stood two guards at the opened door of the prison she was in.

"The king requested you." One of them said.

" _He_ requested _me?!"_ She said. "No way I'm going with you! Leave me alone!"

"Are you resisting his command?"

"Yes, I am! I _dare_ resist his damn command!"

"You're a prisoner here, don't forget that." The other guard said. "And a prisoner has to follow the order. If you don't choose the easy way, then we'll have to go for the hard way. Choose wisely."

"Go on! Do whatever you can to drag me out, but I'm not going out myself!"

"Well, you asked for it."

The guards walked toward her and she was ready for whatever they were going to do. They could beat her to death, and she would still be okay and prepared to it. But it totally wasn't what she expected as one gaurd held her waist, keeping her in place as she tried to squirm out of his tight grip. While the guard was doing so, the other held her wrists and tied her wrists tightly with a strong rope, pulling her forward. She tried to stand in place, but the other guard pushed her hard enough to make her walk.

The two guards managed to drag her out, despite her struggling. They soon reached the king, who was sitting at his throne, and let go of her, standing on both side of her so that she wouldn't be able to escape.

"You're late." Magnus said.

"She didn't want to come, so it was very difficult for us to drag her all the way here." One of the guards said.

"Let. Me. Go!" She exclaimed and struggled to get out of her restrain.

Ignoring her doing that, he asked as he crossed his hands in front of his chest and tapped his finger on his left arm. "May I know your name, princess?"

"As if I'm going to tell you!"

Just right after she finished, the two guards held up their spears and crossed them in front of her neck, threatening her silently. Seeing how close the spears were, she tried to hold back her anger and mumbled.

"Ellegaard." She answered shortly.

"I'm sorry, but I didn't quite hear what you said." Magnus said as he continued to eye her.

"Ellegaard…" She started to get annoyed as she had to repeat.

"I'd like it if you speak more clearly, please."

"ELLEGAARD, for GOD'S SAKE!" She yelled.

"Behave yourself, prisoner!" The guards held their spears closer to her neck.

"Put them down. She stated her name, so no need to do that anymore." Magnus said and the guards moved the spears away from her neck, making her feel relieved secretly.

The two royals continued to stare at each other as silence washed over the throne room. He knitted his eyebrows a little bit as he looked thoughtfully into her eyes, which was making her feel uncomfortable. What was going in his mind was forever a mystery, though she desperately wanted to know.

"Ellegaard…" He spoke up. "You will be my personal servant."

Her eyes doubled in size. "I'm… sorry?"

"You will be my personal servant from now on." He repeated.

"Excuse me?!" She exclaimed. "I'm a princess, and now I have to be a personal servant of my kingdom's ENEMY?!"

"Apparently, you do." His calm attitude was starting to make her feel annoyed. How the heck did he manage to stay calm like that when she was literally throwing all her rage on him?

"I'll do that only when the sun rises the WEST! What are you thinking?! That's absolutely a shame to me!"

He said nothing.

"Why don't you just kill me now?! Dying is scary, but it's even better than serving YOU!"

"Guards, lead her to the room next to the one of that maid from Redstone Kingdom. And watch her carefully, do not let her escape or kill herself." Ignoring her, Magnus said, once again, calmly. "Ellegaard, it's evening now. You will have tonight to prepare before starting your work tomorrow."

"No! NO! Let me go! Let me go!"

Ellegaard shouted as the guards dragged her outside.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3: First day  
**

"We're here."

One of the two guards said as he opened the door while his other hand was still holding the princess, who was trying her hardest to struggle out of their grasp. Once the door was fully opened, they threw her harshly onto the floor, making her let out a small yelp.

"Hey, can't you be gentler?!" She exclaimed.

Ignoring her, that same guard held the doorknob and was about to close the door before he stopped midway. "Rest and remember to wake up early tomorrow."

The other guard spoke up. "And don't try to run away or kill yourself. We'll make sure you won't be able to do that."

And with that said, they slammed the door shut. Groaning, Ellegaard collected herself from the ground and dusted her body and dress. She then took a look around her room. It was sure a room for a maid, so she couldn't really ask for much. The room was very small, only had enough space for one person to walk around comfortably. There were twin windows and white curtains attached to them. There was only a bed that was placed beside the window and only one person could sleep on, a cupboard that was opposite the bed, a bathroom, a nightstand beside the bed and a desk placed at the opposite wall to the wall where the bed was. Surprisingly enough, the room was very clean, not dusty like she expected.

"Those bastards…" She groaned again. "Oh well… guess that I have to stay here and… do god-knows whatever they tell me." She yawned and looked at the clock placed on the nightstand. It was nearly eleven at night and she sighed. "Time for bed, no-longer-princess Ellegaard…"

She couldn't wear her dress to sleep, so she opened the wardrobe and looked for something she could wear tonight. The first thing that caught her eyes was a knee-length long-sleeved dress that she supposed was the nightgown of the maids here, and she took it out without looking more into the wardrobe. She put it on and plopped onto her bed, setting the alarm. Since she had gone through days without sleeping because of her worries, she soon found herself drifting to sleep, letting her tired mind rest as well.

* * *

Ellegaard was still sleeping peacefully until something startled her, waking her up. Looking over the direction of the noise, she realized that it was the alarm clock that was ringing loudly. Groaning, she slammed a hand on top of it, turning the alarm sound off. She then yawned and look over the clock to see that it was 5:40 AM, the time she set last night.

"Morning…" Rubbing her eyes, she got off her bed and walked over the bathroom. "Time to get ready for my very first freaking day of work here…"

After getting ready in the bathroom, she opened the wardrobe to find some clothes to put on. She then found three maid uniforms and took one out. It consisted of a long-sleeved black dress blouse with white collar, a long black dress that reached the middle of her forelegs and pinafore apron with a pocket and frills at its shoulder straps and its lower part. She also found a pair of black heels with straps, a maid white lacey headpiece and black stockings.

Finishing putting them on, she looked at herself in the small mirror hung on the wall and spun around. "Hmm… it looks pretty nice, to be honest."

Something snapped in her mind after she just finished it. "W- what are you talking about, Ellegaard?! You're wearing a maid outfit, at _your enemy's_ kingdom, not yours!"

Just when she finished it, there was suddenly a knock on the door. She walked toward it and turned the doorknob, annoyed. But just after when the door was opened, someone jumped onto her, bringing her into a tight hug.

"W- What…?" She said in surprise. "W- Who are you?! Get off me!"

"I'm so glad you're safe, Princess!"

That person said and Ellegaard recognized this voice. As they pulled away from each other, her eyes widened when she saw who that was. Standing in front of her was her once personal servant, Olivia, who had tan skin, short curly black hair that brushed over her shoulder blades and a pair of black eyes.

"O- Olivia?!" She exclaimed. "Is it really you?!"

"Yes, it's me, Your Highness!" Olivia said happily. "Thank god, you're okay! I was so worried for you! Last night, I heard your voice from my room and immediately ran out of my room to check on you. But the guards wouldn't let me come in, they said that I and you came from the same kingdom, so there might be a chance that I would help you escape."

"Those jerks…" Ellegaard mumbled and got surprised when she looked at the other girl. She was wearing the same maid outfit like her. "Why are you wearing this?"

"Oh, they let me live here as a maid, Your Highness." Olivia answered. "They asked me what I did at out kingdom and I told him that I worked as the princess's personal servant. He told me to do some cleanup things to test me and then after a while, he let me stay here…"

"Really…?"

"Yes, Your Highness. That was very strange, if you ask me."

A short silence went between them before Ellegaard spoke up, breaking it. "Aren't you surprised that I'm wearing this outfit?"

"Well…" Olivia said. "The guards led you here, so I guess the king let you stay here as a maid here too, didn't him?"

"I'm a servant, but not just _any_ servant…" Ellegaard gripped her dress. "I'm the _king's personal_ servant."

Hearing this, Olivia gasped out loud. "Is that true, Your Highness?! You're kidding, aren't you?!"

"I'm serious, Olivia…" Ellegaard bit her lips. "And you don't have to call me 'Your Highness' anymore, since we're in the same place now."

Olivia didn't say anything for a while. "Princess…"

Ellegaard stayed silent.

"Alright, it's your first day here, so I'll take you around the castle Your Hig- I mean, E- Ellegaard!"

Sighing heavily, Ellegaard walked alongside Olivia outside. "Lead the way."

* * *

"This is the kitchen, Ellegaard."

Olivia said as she pushed open the white twin doors. Walking inside, Ellegaard took a quick look around. The kitchen was kind of familiar from the one at her kingdom and it was full of people. It was early in the morning, so she supposed they were busy preparing for breakfast.

"Oh, you said that you're the king's personal servant, right?"

Ellegaard nodded and Olivia looked kind of nervous suddenly. She said a little quieter while twiddling her thumb. "Uh… um… you know what to do now, d- do you?"

Ellegaard raised an eyebrow.

"G- God, how do I say this…?" Olivia said nervously. "Um… Well, do you remember that every morning when I was still your personal servant, I used to bring breakfast to you while you're still in bed, r- right?"

Ellegaard thought for a while before the idea clicked in her head.

"God no…" She face-palmed and groaned.

Olivia sighed. "I don't want this either, but… I guess you'll have to do this on your own, Ellegaard…"

* * *

"I hate this already…"

Ellegaard mumbled just loud enough just for herself to hear. With Olivia pointing the direction for her, she was walking toward the king's room with a silver tray held by her hands. On the tray was a very fancy breakfast, which consisted of a stack of pancakes with maple syrup and butter, two fried eggs, some crispy fried bacon strips, some slices of strawberries, some blueberries and a cup of orange juice. Just by looking at it made her mouth water, but she tried to hold it back.

She soon saw two big twin doors and immediately knew that she reached Magnus's room. Inhaling, she thought. 'Here goes nothing…'

She knocked on the doors three times with her shaking hands and waited for a respond. Shortly after, she heard someone spoke up from inside.

"Come in."

She gulped and slowly pushed the door open using one hand while the other held the tray. Walking inside, she saw a man sitting on his bed in his white kurta pajama, looking at her with that same unreadable expression.

"G- Good morning. I- I came to bring you y- your breakfast…" Her voice was stuck for a while as she tried to force the two last words out. "… Your M- Majesty."

'Goddamnit, why are you stuttering, Ellegaard?!' She thought.

Walking toward his king-sized bed, she felt extremely uncomfortable with him keeping his stare on her. She felt... disgusted, and offended in a way, as she put the tray on his bed as gently as she could, trying to avoid his stare.

"Thank you. You may go now."

"Yes, Your Majesty. E- Enjoy your meal!"

She walked out as quickly as she could. Right after she closed the door behind her, she was finally able to let out her heavy breath as sweated, feeling relieved that she didn't screw up anything. While she was attempting to walk out of the room fast, she could feel his stare on her the whole time, and she was very _uncomfortable_ with it. His stare… It was definitely scary, but it held… something…

"Why me…?" She mumbled quietly.

* * *

Lunch was over. Ellegaard was walking alone at the hallway, heading to her room to get some rest. While she was doing so, she bumped into someone and quickly bowed down, mumbling out an apology.

"I- I'm so sorry!"

"It's okay."

She looked up to see a young woman that was about her age. She had long black hair that reached the middle of her back with a yellow hairclip at her bang and a pair of green eyes. She was wearing a knee-length blue pregnancy dress with short white sleeves and in her hands was a small box tied up with red ribbons.

"Oh, you don't look familiar to me." The woman said. "Are you new here?"

"Y- yeah…" Ellegaard said. "I'm Ellegaard."

"Ellegaard? So you're the king's personal servant?"

"Yes…" She didn't want to hear the words 'personal servant', yet everyone had to say them at least once.

"Oh, nice to meet you then." The woman smiled. "My name is Jesse."

"Hello Jesse." She said. She kind of trusted this woman, although she didn't know why. Maybe because she was nice to her, even though she knew Ellegaard was from the other kingdom? "Sorry for bumping into you again."

"I told you, it's okay. It's very nice to meet the king's servant."

"Yeah… haha." Ellegaard chuckled, feeling ashamed and embarrassed at the same time. "A- anyway, where are you going?"

"I'm going to my husband's practice place." Jesse said. "He's a guard here, and I'm going there to give him some snacks."

"C- can I come? I'm new here, and I kind of need to, you know, go around here to get used to it."

"Sure." Jesse smiled as they walked alongside each other. "Follow me."

While walking, there was a rather uncomfortable silence between. There was still a very long way before they could even reach the end of the hallways that led outside, so Ellegaard had an urge to break it, or else it would become too much to bear.

"So… what's your job here?"

"Oh, I was a cook. So His Majesty gave me a temporary dish-washing job, since a cook needs speed which I couldn't have since I'm having a child. It was very considerate of him to do that, really."

"I see."

'Considerate, you said...'

Ellegaard kept that thought to herself as they continued their conversation.

* * *

Jesse and Ellegaard soon reached the guard's training field. Clanking sound of the spears was heard, some guards were giving all they'd got and some were resting with sweats on their face. Jesse looked around for a while and shouted while waving one hand.

"Lukas dear!"

Ellegaard looked to the direction Jesse was looking at and saw a man with blond hair and blue eyes in his armor standing from afar. He was holding his helmet in his hands and she guessed that he just took it off, judging by the amount of sweats on his face.

Seemed to spot Jesse, he quickly walked to her. "Jesse? What are you doing here?"

"I came to give you some snacks, honey." She gave him the box and he took it.

"You know you don't have to make these for you, since you need rest more."

"I know, but practicing can be very tiring so I want to make something for you."

"Thanks a lot, Jesse." He smiled.

Turning over Ellegaard, he looked at her for a while before turning back to Jesse. "Who's this?"

"Oh, almost forgot to introduce. Ellegaard, this is my husband, Lukas. Lukas, this is Ellegaard, the king's new personal servant."

"Oh, Ellegaard?" Lukas said, looking at Ellegaard. "I've heard a little about you moving in here to work."

"Yes, nice to meet y-"

"JESSE!"

She was cut off when someone suddenly shouted. Then, a man ran to them from nowhere. He was wearing his armor like Lukas and had short brown hair and green eyes. He was huffing heavily.

"Jesse, WHY ARE YOU HERE?!" He yelled. "You're supposed to rest!"

"Calm down Jess." Jesse said. "I just came here to give Lukas his snack-"

"Snack? SNACK?!" Jess yelled at Lukas. "Lukas, you made her make snacks for you, regardless of her pregnancy, DIDN'T YOU?!"

"Jess!" Jesse exclaimed. "I care for him, so I made some for him WITHOUT anyone forcing me, alright?"

"Alright…" Jess towered over Lukas. "Lukas, I'm not going to repeat this, but if something terrible happens to her then _you're dead,_ got it?"

"G- got it!"

Jess then walked away when someone called him to get back to practice. "Who was that?" Ellegaard asked.

"That's Jesse's twin brother, and also my brother-in-law." Lukas said. "He can be _very_ scary sometimes, as you can tell…"

"Oh, don't worry about it." Jesse gave him a peck on the cheek. "He's not gonna hurt you with me here."

"Haha… thanks sweetie."

Ellegaard sighed lightly.

At least her first day wasn't as bad as she thought.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4: The Rain  
**

"Your Majesty! Your Majesty!"

Magnus, who was walking along the hallway, stopped in his track when he heard someone calling for him from behind. Turning around, he saw that a man with quite pale skin black hair, black beard and a pair of black eyes was running toward him with a roll of paper in his hands. Ivor, who was the royal scientist there and regardless of his rather old age, he was still very cheerful, and he always acted like a little kid who got a present on Christmas when he showed his king his new invention.

"What is it, Ivor?" Magnus said, standing still while waiting for Ivor to come beside him.

Reaching Magnus, the scientist huffed. "Y- Your Majesty, I got a new idea for a new potion!"

"Another one, you said?"

"Y- Yes!" Ivor started walking to catch up with Magnus, who had already started to walk away. "I'm sure that this one will _definitely_ make you interested!"

"You always say that, Ivor." Magnus rolled his eyes. "And there's barely a time that _actually_ happens."

"No no, Your Majesty. This time I PROMISE that you'll be proud!"

Magnus stayed quiet for a while before saying. "Okay, tell me then."

"Well, I've written all of the things about the potion on here." Ivor said, unrolling the large piece of paper he was holding. On it, lots of strange ingredient names and chemical formulas were written all over it. "I call this 'The Lizard Potion'!"

Just the name made Magnus want to roll his eyes again.

"This potion will help one change whenever color he wants, like a lizard! As you can see, this one is very difficult to make, since it contains very complicated ingredients that are very hard to work with. And also…"

Ivor kept one saying about his potion, nor giving a care at the world around him. Hell, he didn't even notice that Magnus wasn't even listening to him. Usually, when Ivor came up with something, it would always be a very crazy and ridiculous one, to Magnus's opinion. And when he started doing that, he would end up making a huge mess. He had blown up his lab multiple times, and Magnus had to get it fixed or even rebuilt sometimes. The reason why Magnus kept him was that when he succeeded, the inventions would be super useful, and plus his ideas were sometimes too crazy for anyone else to come up with.

Magnus ignored Ivor again as usual, but this time he also found his mind drifting to a certain someone. Ivor's voice, along with everything else, seemed to fade away from his world. Her images filled his mind. The way her dress swayed as she took every step, how her hair flew so gently as a blow of soft wind came by, and especially how her eyes sparkled…

Snapping out, he slightly shook his head, returning his attention back to reality.

"And that's all, Your Majesty!" Ivor finished his explaination- actually, babbling, to Magnus. "What do you think?"

"Um…" Since Magnus weren't paying attention, he was just going to find something random to say. "It's… pretty good."

Ivor blinked for like ten times before he was able to speak up.

"I- I beg your pardon, Your Majesty?"

"You did a good job planning them all out." Magnus said, crossing his arms. "You better finish that potion soon."

And with that said, he walked away, leaving Ivor behind standing motionlessly in his place. He just got _complimented_ by his king, who had never _actually_ complimented him like that.

"Oh… my… god…"

…

"THE KING COMPLIMENTED MY WORK! My dear wife Harper! I JUST GOT A COMPLIMENT FROM THE KING!"

He shouted in pure happiness while literally skipping through the hallway.

* * *

"That Ivor…" Magnus mumbled to himself as he heard Ivor yelling from very afar. "Did he seriously take that fake compliment?"

He shrugged his shoulder.

"Oh well… Gotta give him some motivation to work with, anyway."

He continued walking further into the royal garden. It was quite late at night and the sky was a dark blue with some of the clouds still floating. The bright stars were twinkling and the moon was shining down onto the ground below gently. Soaked by the soft moonlight, the flowers bloomed beautifully as the grass rustled, making a very quiet and gentle sound. This beautiful sight never failed to give him a calming feeling. Despite his cold heart, he still adored it very much.

Suddenly, he spotted a familiar figure from afar…

* * *

Ellegaard walked slowly around as the grass below rustled with the wind, putting her hands behind her back. She couldn't sleep, so she decided to go outside and ended up here in the royal garden.

The beautiful sight around her reminded her so much of the garden she had seen lots of time during the days before the war. Those days were so precious to her. She missed the birds chirping on the trees and the butterflies gently passing by, some of them landed onto her hand. She still remembered how the flowers bloomed gorgeously, especially during spring, as she and her favorite servant Olivia had a picnic together, enjoying the fresh air. God, how much she longed to return to those times.

But… you can't return to the days that are called "past", that's a fact everyone knows. What happened, happened. You can't get back, no matter how much you want to. Regardless of how much she missed her lost kingdom, she simply couldn't go back… She had to stay here and live on in the "presence".

Sighing quietly, she sat down onto a bench under a tree, alone in the night. Suddenly, drops of water landed on her face. It was a rain, a very small one, just like the ones in the beginning of a beautiful spring. Extending one hand out, she let the raindrops fell into her palm, looking up at the deep blue sky above her.

Her eyes started to water. When she was still a little princess, whenever a small rain like this passed, she would go out and play with the King and the Queen. Catching the soft, tiny raindrops into her palms was one of her most favorite things to do. She loved watching the raindrops sparkled just like the early morning dew.

"Mom… Dad…"

Unable to hold back her emotions, she let her tears shed and roll down her rosy cheeks. She sobbed quietly, gripping her skirt tightly. She didn't bother to wipe them away since there was no one else in the garden. At least that was she thought.

She kept crying…

Crying…

And crying… letting her emotions out…

Her eyelids started to feel heavy after a long while. She soon found herself drifting into sleep without even realizing it…

* * *

Ellegaard was startled awake when the alarm went off. Reaching out her hand, she slammed it onto the clock, shutting it up. Stretching out her arms tiredly, she slowly looked around and found out that she was in her room. That wasn't something strange to her, except today.

She still remembered that she was in the royal garden last night and she assumed that she fell asleep, but she ended up here in her room… somehow. That was what she was trying so hard to figure out.

Deciding to just ignore that, she got ready and headed to the kitchen.

* * *

"Good morning, Your Highness." Ellegaard said as she walked toward Magnus, who just woke up and was sitting on his bed. "I brought you your breakfast."

Not waiting for him to instruct her any further, she walked over his nightstand and put the tray onto it. He stayed silent, like always, but she had been serving him for over a month now so she knew what he would usually told her to do.

"I'll take my leave now. Enjoy your meal, Your Majesty."

With that said smoothly without any stuttering like a few weeks ago, she turned the doorknob and walked outside his room. Once she closed the door behind her, he said just loud enough for him to hear.

"She doesn't show any sign of illness, so she seems to not catch a cold from last night. Good."

* * *

 **Honestly, at the beginning of the game, I hated Ivor a little because… he was the one who caused the troubles. But in the further episodes, he suddenly turned into an adorable cinnamon roll. XD**

 **Anyway, thanks for reading. I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Please leave a review and I'll see you again soon.**

 **Bye!**


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5: Unexpected encounter**

It was a fine morning and Ellegaard had just brought Magnus his breakfast, so now she was heading back to the kitchen. It was a long walk back, so it was quite easy to understand that it could take her a whole twenty minutes to go from the king's room to the kitchen. As she was walking down the hallway, she overheard a conversation.

"Good morning Anna."

"Oh my god! G- Good morning sir! How are you today?"

"I'm great, and you, beautiful?"

"I- I'm fine! Thanks for asking!"

She walked pass them, not bothering to move her gaze from the floor up to see who they were. She just knew that the voices belonged to a young girl and a man. But the point was… when she walked pass, she _swore_ she felt a pair of eyes _looking at her_.

"I gotta go now. Have a nice day." The man said.

Trying to ignore the chill that ran down her spine, she kept walking, heels clanking on the floor below her. While doing so, she heard the same voice of that girl talking to another one.

"Oh my god! Did you see that? Sir Soren just greeted me _and_ called me 'beautiful'!"

"Wow, you're so lucky! I'm jealous!"

'Must be a charming knight she was talking to.' Ellegaard sighed as she rolled her eyes. There were a lot of handsome knights here, and the girls loved talking to them. It was a typical thing, she admitted.

She kept heading forward… until a hand was placed on her shoulder, stopping her on her track.

"Hello."

Being startled, she turned around to see a man smiling at her. He was a ginger-haired man with a pair of black eyes. Despite his beard and moustache, he still looked pretty young, and possibly _cute_ , if she took the girls' excitement when they saw him into account.

"I don't remember seeing you around." The man said, still smiling at her. "May I know your name?"

"Uh…" Ellegaard trailed off, surprised by the sudden encounter. "I'm Ellegaard."

Hearing her name, his eyebrow fused together a little and his smile faded, but then his cheerful expression returned. "Oh, you're the king's personal servant? I've heard of you, but I don't come here very quite often, so that might explain why I didn't recognize you at first, although… it has been over a month, haha."

The man chuckled while she had a very confused expression on her face.

"Oh, very sorry. My bad." He said, seeing the hint she gave through her face. "How rude of me not introducing myself. I'm Soren the Royal Architect."

Soren? The Royal Architect? Wow. An architect, yet she thought he was a _mighty, charming knight_ a while ago.

"It's very honorable to meet you, Sir Soren." She held the sides of her dress and lifted it up a little bit as she bowed down, remembering what she had to do when meeting a person who has an important role.

She expected him to say something. But what he did next was completely out of her expectation.

Out of a sudden, he held her hand and gave it a little kiss.

"Pleased to meet you too, Ellegaard, the king's personal servant."

He looked up at her and a charming smile was seen on his lips, hand still holding hers. She felt her face burnt up a little bit from embarrassment. Now she understood why the girl from a few minutes ago was so excited about him greeting her. Who could resist that gentlemanly gesture from a young ginger-headed architect?

" _Ahem._ "

A cough was heard and Ellegaard was pulled sideways, her shoulder touching someone's chest.

Looking up from her hand, Soren greeted someone with a gentle smile. "Oh, good morning, Your Majesty."

Upon hearing what Soren called that person, Ellgaard shivered a little. As she looked up, her theory was confirmed. It was Magnus, who was glaring at Soren while holding her shoulder, keeping her close to him. It was that stare of his again, but this time it seemed different. It wasn't thoughtful anymore, but threatening and somehow worried at the same time.

"Good morning, Soren." Magnus said, voice low. "What are you doing here?"

"Oh, we're just doing a little introduction, Your Majesty." The architect's chuckle soon turned into a grin. "Don't worry about it. It wasn't like I was doing to do anything weird to your _personal servant_ anyway."

Magnus tightened his grip on Ellegaard's shoulder. "Be careful with what you say and do, Soren."

"Yes, I'll keep that in mind. Have a good day Ellegaard." Soren was about to walk away when he suddenly remembered something. "Oh, and have a nice day too, Your Majesty."

With a light chuckle, he took his leave. But as he reached the point where his face was beside the king's ear, he whispered.

"I know what's going on _, Magnus."_

Magnus gasped upon hearing what the architect said. Turning around, he saw that Soren had walked a few feet away, not bothering to stop or look back at the two. He bit his lips as he fist his hand secretly.

Ellegaard's little struggle snapped him out of his thoughts. "Um… Your Highness…"

Realizing that he was holding her very tightly for way too long, he let go of her, letting her took a step forward. She then turned around and asked.

"Did you need anything, Your Highness?"

"No. I just happened to pass by."

Just like Soren, he suddenly grabbed that same hand of hers without any warning. He stared at it, specifically at where Soren kissed.

"What did he say to you?"

"Uh… He just… gave me a morning greeting and told me who he was, Your Majesty."

Not responding, he stared at her hand and then back at her, making her a bit uncomfortable with it, especially about how he was holding and looking at her hand. Luckily, he released it not long after.

"Is there somehing wrong-"

"Get back to work."

And with that, he walked away, leaving her behind all confused about what had just happened.

'What's with these two men?'


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6: Heavy rain**

Ellegaard walked slowly in the garden, embracing herself to warm her body up as the cold droplets of rain soaked her body.

A month and a half had passed since the day Ellegaard was given a job here as the personal servant of the king. At first, she hated it so much, especially how she had to serve the king of her kingdom's enemy. And not just hatred, she also suffered the pain her old memories gave her. She just wanted to forget all, but sometimes she wanted to embrace them tightly, so that she would still have some sanity to survive through the days. Old memories made her hurt, but they also made her strong to overcome troubles during the time she was forced to stay here, working as a servant.

But, as a fact, everyone had their own limits. It was true that she tried her best to stay sane, but… now, she just couldn't take it any longer… Especially what happened this morning…

* * *

 _Ellegaard accidentally bumped into someone as she was walking down the hallway. She looked up from the ground and saw a blond maid with green eyes, who looked very annoyed._

" _Hey, watch where you are going!" She scolded._

" _I'm- I'm sorry." Ellegaard bowed down, mumbling an apology._

" _Sorry? Then why didn't you watch your way in the first place?!"_

" _Hey…" Said another maid beside her, who had dark curly hair and blue eyes. "There's no point in arguing over such thing. You know she didn't mean to."_

 _The blond one was about to say something, but then stopped and let out a sigh. "Hmp! Okay, I forgive you. But be careful next time, alright?"_

 _Without waiting for Ellegaard to say anything more, the maid walked pass her with her friend, ignoring her completely. Ellegaard let out a heavy sigh before taking her leave, but stopped when she heard the voice of the blond girl whispering._

"Hey, isn't that the king's personal servant?"

 _The other maid whispered back._ "Yeah. You didn't notice her until now?"

"That girl…" _The blond one said, ignoring the other's question._ "I heard that she resisted when the king decided to make her his personal servant, correct?"

"You're right."

 _The blond_ _let out a huff and said._ "She only looks down on everyone here, I'm sure of that. Being the king's personal servant is every girl's honor here, yet she refused that offer! How arrogant. Who does she think she is?!"

"Um… I don't think you should judge her like that, maybe she didn't really like it."

"Whatever. She's just a useless, unworthy bitch."

* * *

" _She's just a useless, unworthy bitch."_

Those last words kept ringing in Ellegaard's mind non-stop. Arrogant? Useless? Unworthy? A bitch…? Was she really a person like that in people's eyes here? Did people hate her that much, just because she was once a princess from the other kingdom who was supposed to die a long time ago? Did people think she deserved to die or be treated like trash here? Or they just kept her here to mentally torture her like that?

People gossiped behind her back. This had happened multiples times.

She had tried to ignore their words. But now, she had had enough.

She just wanted to die, running away from the gruesome world she was living in. She had tried to keep going, only to hear cruel gossips and receive cruel torment.

Outside, only the sound of the heavy rain was heard. It kept raining and raining, soaking her body, joining the tears to run down her cheeks. But she didn't care, she didn't care about anything any longer. Rain could soak her as much as it could, people could judge her as much as they wanted. Nothing mattered anymore.

She didn't know how long she had been walking, she just knew that her designated place was soon showing itself more clearly as she took more steps forward. She had gone out here for many times, and she knew that there was a very wide and deep river flowing through the garden. Every time she felt sad, she often came here and looked down at herself as walked along the small bridge built on top. It was a very beautiful sight, and today she came here once again, but this would be the last time she would ever see it, along with this world.

Standing on the middle of the high bridge, she looked down at herself on the river surface one last time. The raindrops made the water surface moved rapidly, just like how her mind was filled with so many thoughts right now.

She bent her body forward, but then a voice stopped her.

"Ellegaard!"

Startled, she looked over the direction of it before she saw Magnus standing near the end of the bridge, a few feet away from her.

"What are you doing here in the rain, Ellegaard?" He asked loud enough for her to hear between the rain. "It's nearly midnight!"

"I'm supposed to be the one to ask that, Your Majesty." She said, annoyed that he disturbed her.

"That's not important right now. What are you doing here?"

Staring at him for a while, she sighed. "I'm enjoying the rain, Your Majesty. No one is here, so I can enjoy myself for a little bit."

"You're lying."

She sighed again. "Well, then what do you think I'm doing?"

"Just answer me for once, Ellegaard." He said before repeating his question. " _What_ are you _doing here?_ "

"I'm about to _kill myself_ , _Your Majesty."_ She groaned. "There, are you happy? Can you leave me alone now?"

"I can't. I can't let you do it."

"Why not?"

"You are my personal servant, Ellegaard. And you have to do what I tell you-"

" _SHUT UP!"_ She shouted out loud, voice piercing through the rain. "I'm tired of this life! I have wanted to die in the first place, but then I tried to keep myself sane and _obeyed_ you! My parents died and my kingdom is lost, and yet I have to stay here, serving you!"

"You're not the only one!" He spoke up. "My parents passed away too, you know! And now I have to continue ruling my kingdom without any loved one by my side!"

"But at least that your kingdom is in peace now! What about mine? It's long gone, and my people are still yearning for the help of their princess, who is staying in their enemy's castle, obeying orders in shame! And while that happens, people here gossip about me, saying that I'm just a bitch who looks down on them and just depends on you to stay here! They don't understand! You don't understand! _No one understands!_ "

Tears painfully continued rolling down as she poured her thoughts out to him, who was staying quiet most of the time. Her knees felt weak and she knelt down onto the platform underneath her feet, sobbing into her hands.

"P- Please… just… leave me alone… I don't want to live in a life like this…"

Without her knowing, he had knelt down in front of her. Wrapping his arms around her, he pulled her into his body tightly yet dearly. She yelped out of surprise, but made no effort of pushing away. Instead, she just gripped his cape from the back and sobbed into his chest self-unconsciously. She didn't know why, but in his embrace, she felt… safe. The coldness of the rain around her faded away, letting his warmth surrounded her body.

Soon, she passed out between her cry.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7: Arranged marriage**

Chirp chirp… Rustle rustle…

The pleasant sound of the nature outside woke Ellegaard up softly. As she fluttered her eyes open, she shielded them with one hand, hiding them from the gentle and warm sunlight of the early morning. The wind came by, making the curtains flow along slowly.

Tick tock… tick tock…

Yawning, she rubbed her eyes and looked over her alarm clock. It read 5:40 AM, perfect time for her to get up. Despite her urge of sitting up from the bed to get ready for her work, her muscles refused to. She felt her body ache all over for no reason and her head was pounding not so hard, but hard enough for her to whine at the pain. Holding her forehead, she slowly waited for it to go away for a few seconds before deciding to get off her cozy bed so that she could go grab some painkillers. After gulping down the water along with the medicines, she hurriedly got dressed and sneezed quietly when she was in front of her mirror, busily fixing her hair and headpiece.

As she rubbed her nose and sniffed lightly, she heard exactly three knocks on the door. No one could be seeing her at this early in the morning beside Olivia, so she quickly went to open the door. Expecting to see her former personal servant, she was startled at the sight of Magnus standing straight in front of her, still having that emotionless expression of his.

The two started to stare at each other before Ellegaard snapped out and bowed down, still in shock. "G- Good morning, Your Majesty."

"Good morning, Ellegaard." He greeted.

"Um…" She tried her hardest to choose her words carefully. "Do you need anything from me, Your Majesty? You rarely come here this early."

Silence… once again. It seemed like he was having a hard time thinking about what to say. Well, like she mentioned, they'd never met in front of her room like this before, so it felt kind of awkward indeed. For about a few good minutes, no one said a word before a small cough was heard from him.

"Well, I come to check on you be-"

"Your Majesty! There you are!"

Magnus let out a groan in annoyance as he was interrupted. They both over the direction of the third voice and found a young man running toward them. He had short black hair along with a pair of matching-colored eyes. He was wearing a long-sleeved green coat with fluffy white fur at its collar and golden trim at its sleeves, along with brown pants and brown boots.

When the man reached the other two, he seemed to be out of breath as he held a piece of very long paper filled with words, which made Ellegaard assumed that he was Magnus's personal assistant. "Huff… T- Thanks goodness, I found… huff… y- you…"

Ignoring the man's tiredness, the king sighed, once again in annoyance. "What are you doing here, Axel?"

The man named Axel raised an eyebrow in surprise. "Your Majesty, did you forget what day is it today?!"

Magnus looked to another direction for a while before returning back to his assistant and shook his head. "I guess I did."

"Oh my god! Your Majesty, please get back to your room and get ready!" Axel panicked and showed Magnus the paper. "Look! They will be coming here in just a few more hours!"

Looking over the paper, Magnus knitted his eyebrow, seemingly not in a very good mood upon seeing it, but nodded anyway. "Alright, I'm coming."

With that said, the two took their leave, not remembering to say goodbye to the king's personal servant at all. And what were they leaving for? They didn't tell her, but Ellegaard didn't mind that one bit. Instead, she watched Magnus walked away, a rather confused expression on her face. Didn't he say that he came to check on her a while ago? 'Check on her'? What did he mean by that? Did something happen yesterday that she didn't remember?

Taking a deep breath, she spent a few good seconds recalling what happened the day before…

…

"Oh…"

Her face became pale, her hands tremble as she held her head with it.

"Oh no… Oh _god no…_ "

* * *

Evening finally arrived and the workers in the castle busily did their job, not excluding Ellegaard. Despite the busy yet happy atmosphere, there was something in Ellegaard's mind that didn't let her concentrate in working at all.

'Oh god…' She thought worriedly. 'Last night I thought that I could finally end my life, so I spilled all of my thoughts out for him. Now that I'm back here because of an unknown reason, what is he going to do? I did insult him a lot, and now, I couldn't believe that I am regretting doing it. Last night I gave no damn about my life, yet now I'm worrying that he'd kill me for talking crap about him. Gosh, Ellegaard, what are you really doing here?'

She was still cleaning the dining table when she overheard two butlers, who was walking past behind her.

"Hey, did something in the morning happen? I heard a lot of noises unusually coming from both outside and inside the castle, but I haven't had a chance to ask."

The other butler replied. "Oh, didn't you hear already? His Majesty was meeting his meant-to-be future parents and wife from the neighboring kingdom."

Ellegaard froze in place.

The other gasped loudly. "Oh my goodness! Really?! I didn't know that he has an arranged marriage- Wait…" He paused suddenly. "What did you mean by 'meant-to-be future parents and wife'?"

"Well… he disagreed to marry the princess there." The other waiter rubbed his chin as he recalled the event. "He was talking about things like… 'I'm the king, not a prince anymore, so I can make my own decision', yeah, stuff like that…"

"Which kingdom are they from?"

"Um… I think it is the Diamond Kingdom."

"S- Seriously?!" The other exclaimed out loud. "He refused to marry the princess of Diamond Kingdom?! What the heck? I couldn't believe it at all! That kingdom is one of the riches kingdoms, considering how many diamond mines it has. Moreover, the princess is every man's dream woman! I heard people talking about her multiples times, about how she has the beauty of an angel and the intelligence of a genius. And I did have a chance to see her in my own eyes once when I saw her picture from my uncle, and DAMN, was she really like that!"

"Yes, I was surprised that he rejected her, too. But we couldn't really blame him, though. It was his own decision, after all."

"Man…" The other waiter sighed. "If only I were the king, I would nod non-stop if I was arranged a marriage with her. Yes! No kidding, dude!"

"Chill, man… Chill…"

As they continued their conversation while walking far away, Ellegaard's mind was filled with thoughts. A second ago, she was worrying about her damn life, and now she was wondering about what the two man just said. Arranged marriage…? Magnus never told her about that… Was that why he and Axel was so busy preparing for his meeting with his future wife? Sure, she was kind of shocked that Magnus would turn down such thing. Marrying the princess of Diamond Kingdom, Princess Angelica, was every man's dream, and some would literally kill for that. But… what she was wondering wasn't that, but how her heart beat so fast when she heard the words 'His Majesty' and 'arranged marriage' going along each other. She cared nothing about that man, especially about his personal love life. But why did she get so upset when she heard those words?

Jealousy…?

God no! Like mentioned, she gave no damn about him! All she had to do was to clean his room, bring him his breakfast and… do whatever he told her to do! Yeah, that was it, nothing more, nothing less. It wasn't like that she had to check on his feelings every single hour to see if he was sad or angry over anything. Well, that was no one's business but his! If he couldn't control his feelings then who could? Literally God himself? But then again… she was just his personal servant who got kept here by him after so many years of war, and… and…

…

There was no way to describe how she was feeling right now.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8: Confession (part I)**

"Take this, Lukas!" Jesse exclaimed as he swung his sword at the blond male, who swung his sword back and blocked the attack. "C'mon! You've got to have more than that!"

"Just give me all you've got!" Lukas withdrew and snatched Jesse's sword away with a loud clank, aiming his sword in front of him cautiously. "Go on, I will give it my all!"

"That's how I like it!"

The two young men continued their practice with the other pairs in the field, while some were resting. Elsewhere nearby, the maids, who were in their break time, were watching and cheering for their favorite guards. Ellegaard and Jesse were there too, and they were chatting with each other.

"Lukas is quite strong, isn't he?"

"Yeah." Jesse said as she looked at her husband. "He's very competitive too, as well as Jess, which is one of the downsides of theirs."

"I can see why." Ellegaard chuckled lighly as Lukas and Jesse eyed each other carefully, waiting for their partner's attack. The tension could be sensed between them. "But despite that, they both care for you, right?"

"Right… especially Jess." Jesse let out a sigh. "He's _super_ protective over me, like, what the hell? Do you know what he said to Lukas when he found out I was pregnant?"

"Uh… no. But I bet that it was not something good."

" _Exactly._ " Jesse dwelled on that word. "I still remember every word of his back then. He told Lukas 'If you dare hurt Jesse my sister _one bit_ , I'll first tie you up, trap you in where no one can find you, starve you, torture you to the point you go insane, then I'll bloodily take my freaking sword and-'"

"Okay, okay, you can stop now." Ellegaard held up her hands, cutting Jesse off. "I… really don't want to know the rest."

"Yeeeeeah… I don't want to mention it either."

A short silence went between them before Jesse broke it.

"You know…" Jesse started, looking at Ellegaard to get her attention. "This reminds me of the old time."

"Old time?"

"It's about King Magnus." Jesse looked back at the two men while remembering. "Before the war, he didn't use to be so quiet."

"Really?" Ellegaard asked, tone filled with curiosity. "I thought he's always been like that."

"No, not at all." Jesse put one hand on her cheek, the other hand supporting her elbow as her eyes wandered up the blue sky. "He used to be… so cheerful. When he walked around the castle, he would give warm greetings to everyone. Whenever there was a sword practice like this, there was zero chance he wouldn't participate in. And like I told you, I was a cook, but when he knew that I was pregnant, he gave a more suitable and comfortable job for me, which was very thoughtful of him. He seemed to be so full of hopes… until this point of time…"

"I didn't know that at all." Now Ellegaard's curiousity was at its maximum, although she didn't know exactly why.

"Now, he's like a completely different person." Jesse let out another heavy sigh. "He doesn't do this anymore, but after the war ended, he locked himself in his room for months. At first, we weren't used to this tragic change of his, so when we approached him, all we felt was tension." She paused before continuing. "I still remember when a maid accidentally broke one of the vases. It's not his favorite one, since he had none, but it was a very expensive and valuable vase. She thought she was dead, but he said exactly two words 'Clean up' and left. Sometimes, we just want him to yell at us instead of doing that."

"Had you tried to cheer him up?"

"We tried, but he just doesn't talk anymore, as if he's forgotten how to do so-"

"Good afternoon, everyone."

Speak of the devil, there came the king himself.

"Y- Your Majesty!" Running up was a young tan man with brown hair, beard and a pair of matching eyes. He wore a different kind of armor that was a dark blue knelt down, standing out from the rest. He knelt down to Magnus, signaling the others to do the same.

" _Who's that?"_ Ellegaard whispered to Jesse.

" _That's Gabriel, the Head of the Royal guard."_ Jesse glanced over at Ellegaard, whispering back.

"W- What brings you to this place, Your Majesty?" Gabriel asked.

"It's been a long time since I last came here, so I thought some training might do to warm up my body a little."

"B- But are you sure about this, King Magnus?" Lukas said. "I mean, you barely had any practice since-"

" _Shut up, you idiot!"_ Jess hissed as he gave Lukas a light hit on the head.

Not minding the two, Gabriel continued. "Who would you like to train with?"

Without any hesitation, Magnus pointed at Gabriel. "You."

"Me?"

"Yes, you." Magnus looked straight into the leader's eyes. "I want to battle with the Head of the Royal guard himself to test how skilled he is. Besides, an army is nothing without a good leader."

Gabriel nodded, voice filled with confidence. "I accept your challenge, Your Majesty!"

"That's the attitude I like."

* * *

The others took steps back, leaving space for the two opponents. The two bowed down to each other. Face to face, eyes to eyes, Gabriel took out his sword while still maintaining caution. He knitted his eyebrows together, sweats dripping down his face, eyes still on the king opposite him. The king himself on the other side somehow still managed to keep a calm look on his face, his cape flying with the wind.

"Well then…" Magnus spoke up, breaking the silence. He reached his hand down to the handle of his sword on his side. Then, with a quick strike, he took it out, letting the blade shine in the afternoon light. "Do not hesitate to give everything you've got to me."

"Let us begin, Your Majesty."

With that said, Gabriel dashed over Magnus, swinging his sword down in the progress. Seemingly with no effort at all, Magnus moved sideway, let the guard's sword hit the ground with a loud clank. Managing to pull himself together in time, Gabriel blocked Magnus's sword with another clank. After a long while of struggling, the two withdrew from each other, huffing and panting.

"You have nice moves, Gabriel."

"Thank you, Your Majesty. But that's not all."

The battle continued along with the tension between them. Watching from afar, Ellegaard's heartbeat seemed to increase as each minute flew by. She… was worried for Magnus. She still knew that this was just a practice, not a real one on one fight, but she just couldn't stop fearing for him. She was afraid that he would get hurt, for no reason at all.

Half an hour had passed, but it felt like an hour for Ellegaard. Magnus swung his sword, slicing the air as Gabriel ducked, dodging the attack. Then seemingly in no time at all, Gabriel sliced his sword over Magnus's shoulders, accidentally cutting through his skin. Magnus hissed in pain, giving an alarm to the guard. Gabriel threw his sword to the ground, kneeling down in front of the king.

"I'm extremely sorry, Your Majesty!" He said. "I, the Head of the Royal guard, dare hurt Your Majesty. Please give me all the punishment I deserve!"

Magnus didn't say anything for a while, holding to his wound instead. But eventually, he put his sword over Gabriel's shoulder, catching his attention. "There's no need for punishment. You did very well, I must say, and you should be proud of that. Keep up the good work."

Gabriel looked up at Magnus, not saying anything for a good few seconds. He stood up and bowed down, fisting his hands together. "T- Thank you for your words of praise, Your Majesty!"

Turning to the others, Magnus held up one hand. "Everyone, my time here is up. You may get back to work."

The guards got back to their training as the king took his leave. But just after a few steps, he hissed in pain again, holding his hand to the cut on his skin. He used his cape as a bandage and covered it over his wound.

"L- Let me help you get back to your room!"

Ellegaard's voice caught his attention immediately. She froze for a few seconds after realizing what she had just said. Those words just seriously slipped out from her own mouth. She just offered to take him back inside herself, and she couldn't believe it one bit. Like, what the heck?! It was true that she was his servant, but she couldn't imagine that one day she would willingly serve him like a normal servant would.

The silence between them was getting uncomfortable, and she quickly tried to find a way to break it.

"Umm… T- This way, Your Majesty."

Putting one hand on his back and other hand on his arm, she helped him walk back toward his room.

* * *

"Come in."

Magnus looked toward the doors, where there was a knock on the doors. One door slightly open and came in his personal servant. Ellegaard quietly made her way toward his bed, where he was sitting on. In his hand was a book and on the bedside table was a fancy lamp that was lit up, shining itself across the room. As she was beside his bed, he closed the book and asked.

"What's the matter?"

"I- I come to check on your wound, Your Majesty."

She moved her gaze down to his torso that was revealed under the unbuttoned white kurta pajama. His wound was pretty long, from his left shoulder down across and past the middle of his chest, and it was wrapped up with bandages by none other than his servant. Just thinking back the moment when she was treating his wound made her blush. She was kind of uncomfortable when she had to look directly at his bare chest.

"It's like eleven at night, and this is the third time you come for the same purpose." His voice snapped her out of her own mind. "This wound is nothing to worry about, Ellegaard. You don't have to mind that."

"But I do mind!"

Oh Ellegaard, how many regrettable words had you said today?

There it came again, the silence that seemed to last forever.

"D- Do you need anything else, Your Majesty?"

He said nothing, eyes gluing to the book on his laps.

"I'll take that as a no, then. Rest well, Your Majesty."

She turned away, ready to take her step, to return to her room, to sleep and get ready for a new day when it arrived.

She thought she could leave this room just like any other night.

But she didn't know she was wrong.

Before she could step forward, something took a firm grasp on her arm. Her heart skipped a beat at the contact, but she didn't even have enough time to see what it was. Then, with a great force, she was pulled backward and thrown onto the bed with a loud thud, the bed bouncing in the progress. Before she even had time to react, a shadow came into her view, catching her attention. That was when she realized the king himself was hovering over her with his hands wrapped tightly around her wrists.

"Y- Your M- Majesty!" Finding no effort in trying squirm out of his grasp, she stumbled in her words. "W- What are y- you d- doing?! P- Please let m- me go!"

Suddenly, he leaned down to her. Their faces were so dangerously close to each other that she could practically felt his hot breath against her nose.

He then whispered quietly.

"My beautiful princess… When can you finally accept me?"

 **To be continued…**


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9: Confession (part II)**

Thump… Thump… Ellegaard could hear her heart beating so fast and loud inside her chest.

Burning… Burning… Her face felt so hot she thought it would explode in any second.

Tick tock… Tick tock… Only the sound of the clock hanging on the wall was heard as time passed whenever the second hand of it made a movement.

Ellegaard thought her breath had stuck as she and Magnus locked eyes with each other. It had been ten minutes, but she felt like an hour had passed. Time seemed to be stuck in the room. Lips pulsing together, forehead sweating and eyes staring non-stop… She gripped on the bed sheet tightly, trying to look for comfort to calm herself down, because she could possibly go insane with the tension rising between the two of them.

In fact, she questioned herself if she had gone insane already. What did he just call her? "My beautiful princess"? She knew she had been called "beautiful princess" for like a hundred times in her entire life, especially from the men who tried to get her attention, but _"my_ beautiful princess" was out of her imagination. She couldn't even trust her ears for a second there. But it wasn't just that. How he looked into her eyes so deeply as if they were the most beautiful thing the world… She didn't know if she should feel good or bad about this, since most of the girls seemed to like it when boys look at them like they were the most precious thing ever. She wasn't sure if her eyes were that pretty, but she was sure his eyes were. Oh, how they were glimmering under the dim light just like two red emeralds sparkling, like the stars shining on a dark night sky-

Wait a minute, what was she thinking?!

"Ellegaard…?" His voice was low, low enough to send shiver down her spine.

Her senses came back to reality, away from her… unwanted fantasy. She gulped and tried to find something to say. Honestly, it was hard, considering how awkward the situation and their positions were. "Um… Yes, Your Majesty?"

Yes, that was all she could think of, really.

"When can you accept me…?" He repeated the same question he asked a short while ago.

Seriously, she couldn't even understand what he meant, let alone find the right words to answer it.

"Umm…"

The uncomfortable silence went through them again.

Suddenly, as she was about to say something, he got off her and lied beside her on the bed. He let out a sigh, looking at her with a sad gaze.

"Do you know why I'm like this, cold and depressed?"

"… No." She sat up slowly while still maintaining eye-contact with him.

"Well, to tell the truth, I wasn't like this before. I still remembered that I used to be so cheerful and optimistic about the future. My family and my friends loved me very much and I did the same to them, they were the reason why I always felt so happy and safe… until that very day…"

"That day…? Don't you mean…"

"Yes, the day the war started." He paused for a while before continuing, as if memories were flooding back. "I was always raised in a heart-warming world and I thought it would be always like that, but I soon realized I was wrong. It was the first time I saw fires spreading everywhere, breaking down houses, trees and heating up the entire ground. I heard blades clanking together, I saw blood shedding. But what terrified me the most was my family… my friends… falling. My father and mother fought so hard to keep everyone safe, but eventually they left me. Seeing their lifeless bodies on the ground left a scar on my mind, which eventually made me emotionless like today."

"I'm… I'm sorry…" Ellegaard mumbled out quietly.

"It's not your fault." He said as he gently caressed her cheeks, which caught her off guard. The heat at her face returned as the skin made contact. "It's no one's fault."

"Did anyone try to make you feel better?" She asked, although she already knew the answer.

"Yes, the others here did try, and I appreciated their concern for me, but they sadly couldn't cheer me up… except for one person."

"Really? Who?" Her curiosity perked up.

"It's kind of weird, I must say, but it was an imaginary girl I met in my dreams. A few days after the war officially ended, I locked myself in my room for decades, wondering about how long I had to suffer from the pain of losing my parents so suddenly. But then she came, in my dreams, a beautiful and young girl, wearing a red dress. For some reason, I felt like she understood me more than anyone else. She talked to me, showing her most genuine sympathy. And then, then..."

He sighed heavily.

"I found myself falling in love with her without realizing. It's strange how you can fall in love with a person in your dreams, right?"

"It's… okay, I won't judge."

He paused for a while, as if to collect his words. "After a while, I confessed my feelings to her, in my dream of course. And do you know what she did? She just smiled and told me that we would meet someday. That was the last time she showed up."

"Really?"

"Yes, she disappeared forever after I woke up just when she finished. It was a very unclear answer indeed, and I started wondering if she really did mean that, or was there something she was hinting. Those dreams and her words seemed too real to be just a coincidence. I finally made a decision to find her. And you know what..."

He looked deep into her eyes with that same gaze.

"She was _you._ "

She thought her heart had stopped for a second there.

"M- me?!"

"Yes, you. I had tried so hard to find that girl by looking around the kingdom, but no one seemed right to me. So when a guard told me that they had caught a princess from your kingdom, I thought that might be her because I remembered she was dressing kind of like a royal. And turned out I was right, it was really her sitting behind the bars, face soaking in tears…"

She had nothing to say.

"It was not a pretty sight seeing you like that, since you were the one I was looking for, so I found a way to get you out of there without causing any suspicion and… you know the rest."

He stared at her for a while and held her hands tightly, eyes filled with something that Ellegaard couldn't quite figure out. Sadness? Loneliness? Hope? Fear? It was either one of them, or all of them combined. But no matter what it was, it couldn't tone down the beauty of his eyes which Ellegaard had found herself drawn to it. After what seemed like forever, he murmured.

"Please Ellegaard… I was so lonely before you came… so… so…"

He didn't get any chance to finish before his eyes closed slowly and he felt into a deep sleep. Ellegaard, who was feeling anxious the whole time, suddenly felt her mind get relaxed when she found out he was asleep. Feeling confused why, she noticed his face was a little red and put her hand onto his forehead. Yes, her theory was right, he had a fever.

Pulling the blanket up to cover Magnus's entire body, Ellegaard went outside for a while to get a small bucket filled with water and dipped a small white towel in it. After squeezing out all the excess water, she put the towel onto his forehead and let he rest. As she sat at the edge at the bed, she gently stroked his face and thought about what he had said to her a while ago.

Jesse did told her the story about his depression, but Ellegaard never knew about these details. She understood the struggle of losing your parents and your loved ones so tragically, so she couldn't really question why he was feeling that way. But the thing about her being in his dreams… Was he saying that he had been holding back his feelings the whole time to deal with her stubbornness? Did he just confess that he had loved her in the first place? Was he telling the truth?

There were so many questions in her mind.

* * *

Magnus fluttered his eyes open as the warm sunlight outside hit his eyes. It was morning, and the birds were chirping cheerfully on the branches. He groaned as he scratched his head, slowly shifting his body a little bit. His head felt a bit painful, but it wasn't uncomfortable or unbearable. He figured that he could deal with it.

As he moved his gaze over to the side, he found his servant Ellegaard beside him. She was resting her head and arms on the bed, some strands of hair falling down the bed sheet and brushing the long eyelashes of her closed eyes, the sunshine falling on her and making her skin glow softly. She seemed so… peaceful.

While he was admiring her beauty, she let out a small moan and blinked a few times before fully opening her eyes. She yawned quietly and soon saw him staring at her.

"O- Oh! Good morning, Your Majesty. Did you have a good sleep?"

"I think I should be the one asking that, Ellegaard. You seemed to have had a pretty rough night."

"It was nothing. You had a fever, so my duty is to take care of you."

"Fever…?" He held up his hand to touch his forehead in attempt to check his temperature. "I feel nothing."

"Phew, so it must have gotten away then." She let out a relief sigh.

"So I really had a fever, it seems…?" He cocked his head over a little to the side, thinking to himself. "I didn't remember anything from last night."

Her eyes widened at his statement.

"You… _didn't?!_ "

"No, not a single detail. Can you tell me what happened?"

Ellegaard found her breath stuck in her throat for a second. "Um… uh… I went to c- check on you b- but you were already asleep. I found out your temperature was pretty high so I brought things here to help get the fever away."

"I assumed that I didn't do anything... stupid, then."

"W- What do you mean?"

"Sometimes, when I'm drunk or extremely sick, I often say random things that might cause misunderstanding."

"M- Misunderstanding?!"

"Yes." He paused for a moment before speaking up again, not noticing her shaking body. "Why do you look so shocked? Did I really not do anything that might have scare you off?"

"O- Of course n- not, Your Majesty!" She stumbled upon her words. "R- Really! I, uh, just find it a little surprising that you can do that when you're sick."

He stared at her for a while, as if to check the honesty of her words, before speaking up again. "Anyway, thanks for treating my fever. Would you mind getting me my breakfast? I'm quite hungry."

"N- Not at all. I'll be back soon, Your Majesty."

* * *

As she closed the door behind her back, she felt like the world had shut down around her.

He remembered nothing…? All he said might cause a "misunderstanding"? Then did that mean… everything he said the night before was all for nothing, was just "random things"? Was the night before really was a bunch of nothingness? Was the reality really like that? She couldn't bring herself to believe that hurtful truth.

She didn't even expect those words to be real. She had even said that she cared nothing about his feelings and love life, so why… why…

Why did her heart hurt so much?


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10: Confession (part III)**

One month.

One month.

And Ellegaard still wasn't able to move on.

From the moment a person was born until they reached their teenage years, they had to experience love at least once. Ellegaard was different. Because she was a princess and didn't get to meet that many guys like how a normal citizen did. She only got a few chances to meet some princes of the neighboring kingdoms and maybe a few male nobles every now and then. But they just… didn't seem like they would be the one for her, at all. Her parents had tried introducing her to some rich men in the big cities, but no one was really her type. And also because she was a princess, a lot of men who showed talents came to her castle and tried to impress her, but nothing worked out either. For quite a long time, she wondered if she was really that type of princess that was just full of herself and looked down on every man she found imperfect or not worthy to marry her. Half of her told her so, but the other half of her told her the opposite. Maybe she honestly didn't have any feelings or affection toward them and just saw them as friends or strangers.

Finally, she found her answer in her enemy's kingdom.

To be honest, the first time she met Magnus, her eyes seemed to be stuck on him. She stared at him for a very long while, not wanting to look away. Maybe because at that time, she was so angry that she didn't even notice up until now. She was so occupied with trying to get over her past and overcome the humiliation that was piling up deep in her heart. So maybe that was why when she had started opening up a little bit to the new environment, the same feelings started flooding back to her, little by little. She had fallen in love with him. She had fallen in love with the king who ruled the enemy kingdom. Such forbidden love. This wasn't supposed to happen. She wasn't supposed to give her heart to him. She was supposed to show hatred toward him, to show how much she hated him. But love is love, once you fall in love with someone, you can't run away from it. You will be stuck with it, even if it hurts you, even if society doesn't accept it.

Ellegaard felt she was just like Juliet who gave her love for her supposed-to-be-enemy Romeo. But she also felt she and Juliet were different. Juliet overcame what her family told her, what her family forced her to do and finally found her own happiness with her only love. Juliet was strong, and Ellegaard was not. Ellegaard feared many things. She couldn't know what she was supposed to do, she wondered what would happen if anyone knew about this, how they would react… She couldn't find the same strength Juliet had to overcome hardship.

Love can be endearing.

Love can be warm.

But love can be hurtful as well.

Love can break your heart into a million pieces.

Love… is bittersweet.

Ellegaard looked up at the moon. It was glowing brightly in the dark night sky while some stars were twinkling brightly. As a cool breeze came by, she closed her eyes, feeling it as her hair gently joined its movement, blowing gently. The night sky was beautiful, and she couldn't deny it. It usually made her relax, but not tonight.

She couldn't sleep at all. She had been thinking a lot lately, about her love for Magnus. She didn't want to admit it. What would he do if he found out about this? She bet he would be laughing on the inside and look down on her even more. She regretted falling in love with him, but she couldn't help it. She loved him and she hated herself for that. That night when Magnus confessed to her about his dreams, she would be lying if she didn't feel hope. She thought maybe her feelings could finally be accepted by the very one she loved. But then he was also the one crushed that hope of hers when he said it was just his habit of saying things "that might cause misunderstanding".

Leaning her back against the bench, she let out a tiring sigh. Why bothered complaining about it? It wasn't like he truly had feelings for her or showed any sign of affection toward her anyway. Hell, he was _her enemy_ , for god's sake. She didn't know why he let her live, make her his personal servant and even save her from committing suicide in the first place, but she surely knew it wasn't because of love. Maybe he pitied her, or keep her to continue making suffer and be his source of amusement, or something else that she couldn't come up with. But that didn't matter. There was no way he could love her.

The cold breeze came by again. It was just a cold breeze, but she could feel like it was trying to comfort her. She hugged herself, shrinking herself deeper into the thick coat she had on her, and sighed deeply again. The moon shone onto her gently, and she looked up at it. It seemed like it was showing her comfort as well. Then she heard it again, words of comfort. But this time it wasn't just from the wind, the moon, but the whole garden itself. Leaves and grass rustling, flowers glowing in the moonlight, they were all trying to show her words of comfort, to ease her mind down. They were like… her friends, who could only understand her feelings right now.

A drop of tears lands on her hand, then another one… Her sobbing was so quiet, but it was filled with hurt, with regret, with pain. She regretted everything. She regretted loving him, she regretted giving her heart to him and she regretted falling in love just to experience pain.

Why must life be so cruel? It seemed like it just didn't want to miss any chance to make her suffer. First it took her parents away, then it led her to the enemy kingdom, which was half an Earth away from her home and where she was humiliated and looked down the most. And now, it just decided that her heart belonged to him and him only. Why must it be him? Why couldn't it be someone that she could easily express her feelings and love freely, like a normal citizen or servant? Why must it be the King himself, the highest-ranked and most powerful person both in the kingdom and among the royals?

"Good evening."

A voice was suddenly heard behind her. She quickly straightened herself up, wiping her tears and turned around. Judging by the deep voice, there was no doubt it was Magnus. There he was without his crown, standing a few feet away from where she was sitting. She was supposed to stand up and greet him like every servant had to do. But she couldn't stand up, her body couldn't move. She was too emotionally hurt to even move. So she tried to at least look straight at his face and said just loud enough for him to hear.

"Good evening, Your Majesty."

To her surprise, he didn't show any anger toward her misbehavior. But worse than that, he slowly walked closer and sat right next to her. She bit her lips, holding her hand on her chest to calm herself down.

"It's almost eleven, why are you not asleep yet?" He asked.

"I couldn't sleep." She gave him an answer as short as possible, trying to avoid saying something stupid.

"Huh, neither could I. I tried to do some work, but I still couldn't make myself sleepy so I thought about going to the garden a little bit."

He paused for a while, as if he was trying to collect his thoughts.

"The moon is beautiful tonight, isn't it?"

Ellegaard, who was looking down the whole time, stole a glance at him. He was looking up at the sky, and the way he looked made her heart beat rapidly. His eyes were locked on the moon, and the moonlight shone down at him, making his face glowed gently and his midnight black eyes sparkled. He looked so… dreamy.

Snapping herself out of her mind, she quickly looked away and bit her lips so hard that they could possibly bleed. She didn't want to, but she couldn't suppress the emotions that were flooding back to her and she secretly cried again. The pain, it wouldn't stop. Why? Why did she let herself get attached to this man? Why did she even hurt herself with love? Why couldn't she move on-

"Ah-!"

Without her noticing, he had held her chin and turned her face toward his. His eyes narrowed when he spotted the tears rolling down her cheeks, wetting her long eyelashes. She wasn't careful, she wasn't able to hold her feelings down, and now she got caught crying.

"What's wrong, Ellegaard?" He asked, his eyes locked onto hers.

"I- I-" She stuttered. "I got dust in my eyes. It's nothing, Your Majesty." She knew that lie was too old now, but what was she supposed to say in this situation, where she was crying because of him?

"You're a terrible liar."

Magnus sighed and shook his head. As he held her shoulders, he moved his face closer to hers and looked into her eyes again, dead serious.

"Lying is bad, you know." He said in an even lower voice. "Tell me. What's on your mind?"

"N- Nothing, Your Majesty…" She was scared. What was he implying?

"You do know you have to obey my order, don't you?"

She stayed silent.

"Ellegaard…" He suddenly softened his voice. "You shouldn't keep things like that away from me. I may be the king, but that doesn't mean I don't care about your feelings, especially when you're my personal servant."

Did he really mean that, or he was just pretending to pry her secret out? She wanted to know but didn't want to find out at the same time. If it was other things then maybe she could tell him, but this had to be about her freaking romantic feelings toward him! Even if he truly cared, she obviously couldn't bring it up to him one bit. But at this rate, there was zero chance he would let this slip through without her telling him.

She decided to tell half of the truth.

"W- Well, I…" She fiddled with her thumbs nervously, looking down once he had let go of her chin. "I kind of… have a thing for this person…"

She stole a sneaky glance at him. He was wearing a very relaxed expression, but she somehow could tell he was having a very difficult time dealing with his mixed feelings. She didn't know why though, about how she was able to guess that and why he would have mixed feelings. This wasn't even related to him. She paused for a few good seconds, thinking hard before returning back to the subject.

"I… realized that I had fallen in love with him, and that's why I'm thinking very hard about it. Because… um…" She sweated, fearing that he might know she wasn't telling the truth because of her bad lying skills. That wasn't the only thing she feared though. At some point, she might slip her mouth and say something that would completely screw her over. "Because… we are… not supposed to be together… And beside, I think he… may be too cold or even heartless to accept my feelings…"

With a "That's all I can tell you", she could finally looked straight up at his face, feeling relieved that he didn't show any sign of suspicion toward her. But to her surprise, he looked way different from how she expected him to. He looked… hurt. Pain, sadness, disappointment… they were all visible in his eyes. His eyebrows fused together, thinking about something for a very long time. The silence was mixed with the tension, and it went by second by second slowly. She sweated even more, biting her lips with nervousness.

Eventually, he broke the silence.

"That 'cold and heartless' guy is me, isn't it?"

Her heart beat rapidly, and she spoke without thinking.

"H- How did you know-"

Oh no, that wasn't what she intended to say.

"I- I mean, no!"

Crap crap crap crap crap crap crap crap-

"Ellegaard…"

After a heavy sigh was heard, she was suddenly pulled in an embrace. He had wrapped his arms around her small figure without her realizing. Something told her she was supposed to act surprised, that her mind was supposed to be all over the place. But no, she just felt… warm. His embrace was warm. Their chests were touching and she could feel his heartbeat joining hers, beating together in a rhyme. For some reason, her mind was eased down, and she strangely relaxed as she rested her forehead onto his chest. Weird… she would have pushed him away so easily and just run away, forgetting everything that just happened. But somehow she just wanted to stay like this forever, to be eternally near him, to feel his warmth running through her body. No… she wasn't supposed like this at all, she really shouldn't. But she couldn't help it. She had drowned in his heat.

"Ellegaard…" He whispered into her ear, and his soft voice caught her attention. "I'm a cold and heartless king in your eyes, right?... I know I am…"

"N- no, Your Majesty… Y- You have n-nothing to do with this…!"

He sighed again. "You don't need to hide this from me anymore… I had noticed from that night…"

"What night…?"

"The night where I told you about my dreams…" He paused for a few seconds before continuing. "Yes, that night I really was sick, but I took advantage of it. I took advantage of it to confess my feelings to you, and I just brushed it off by telling you it was my habit of saying 'random things' when I was extremely sick. Everything about my dreams is real… I was lying, Ellegaard, I was lying…"

She was speechless, but managed to mumble a few words.

"Why…?"

His voice became even softer.

"I- I'm sorry… I- I was… scared…" He stuttered. "I was scared… I was scared that I wouldn't handle it of you rejected me… I was weak, I feared of rejection… So I had to do it… I knew it hurt, but I had to do it… so that even if you didn't have feelings for me, it would seem like a meaningless rambling of mine, so that you would just forget about it, so that I wouldn't be rejected by you yourself…"

He gripped his hands, tightening his embrace. "But I was wrong… I was selfish… I realized I had accidentally hurt you as well. From that night, I noticed that you weren't like your usual self anymore. You became more distant, but more importantly, you looked hurt and troubled. It hurt me as well seeing you like that. I couldn't stand it anymore, so I swore to myself that I had to tell you all about this as soon as possible…"

"Y- Your Majesty…"

"I know you may hate me for this, but I genuinely love you, Ellegaard. I love you from the deepest reach of my heart. Just like I had told you, you are everything I have. My parents and my loved ones are all gone now, and no one could possibly fill the empty hole in my heart beside you..."

He suddenly straightened his back and held her hands tightly, looking straight into her eyes.

"Please Ellegaard, you can hate me as much as you want, but please just listen to me! You may not feel the same way, but I just want to tell how much I love you! We don't need to be in a relationship, I just want to stay near you! You're the only one who could make my days brighter, who could make me feel comforted everyday!"

With that said, he stopped, completely. He breathed heavily, finally be able to let everything in his mind out. His hands were sweaty and they were still holding hers tight. Meanwhile, Ellegaard was speechless, her entire body shaking. She almost couldn't herself anymore for what she had just heard. Her mind was processing each word of his while her heart beat fast inside her heart. Finally admitting that all the things she heard were real, she burst into tears.

"Y- You-"

He looked at her intensely, but then his expression turned into surprise when she suddenly wrapped her arms around his neck.

"You dummy!"

She cried out as she buried her face into his chest. Her tears soaked his shirt, but these tears of different. These tears were the tears of happiness, the happiness of finally having her feelings accepted. And moreover, he also secretly felt the same way toward her. She scolded him between her sob.

"You dummy! You dummy! I love you too! Why didn't you tell me sooner?! You made me heartbroken for a full month, don't you know that?! It has been a month, but I still couldn't move on! Can't you tell how hurt I am inside?!"

She hugged him tighter. She couldn't stand it. What was this feeling inside her? She should be happy, she should be showing him how much she loved him, but at the same time she felt bitter inside. Knowing he shared the same feeling toward her but kept it a secret for so long that it made her feel miserable, feel unloved, feel rejected… it made her angry for some reason, although she literally did the same.

As her sob became more quiet, she heard him chuckle while stroking her hair. "Ellegaard... don't cry. You're making me feel bad inside by letting me see you like this, you know?"

"I know…" She mumbled. "I know I should be happy… but I couldn't help it. The joy escalated into anger, I guess?" She chuckled quietly, straightening herself up as she let go of his neck. "But to be honest, I- I'm very happy that you accepted me… Your Majesty…"

"I should be the one saying that, Ellegaard. And you don't need to be so formal anymore. We're officially a couple, right?"

"Yeah…"

He scooted a few inches closer so that their bodies were touching. She rested her head against his shoulder while he wiped her tears and stroked her hair. Her hair was really soft, each strand intertwined with his fingers and a soft wind blew by made it flow so gently.

"Magnus…" His heart skipped a beat, hearing her calling his name for the first time, and so lovingly too. "You know we're supposed enemies, right?"

"Yes, I do remember, Ellegaard."

"I… fear for our relationship, Magnus…" She clutched her dress. "I'm still a princess to my people. Some of them are still currently held captive and some are even at the brink of death. I'm the one responsible for saving them, but now I'm with you, so what will they think…?"

"Don't worry Ellegaard, they will be safe." He replied. "Tomorrow, I will give out the order to release all the prisoners from your kingdom."

"Thank you, I appreciated that a lot, but…" She gripped her skirt even tighter. "How will they look at me… if they find out about our relationship? And I'm scared about you too… You also have a kingdom to take care of, and I'm their enemy as well…"

"Don't think about it too much, Ellegaard." He kissed her on the forehead while rubbing her shoulder. "I'm sure we will manage to make things work out together."

She smiled in comfort.

"Yes, you're right."

* * *

 **Wow, this chapter got unexpectedly long! It's more than 3000 words. Goddamn! It's also funny how I was yelling on the inside about the writer block when I started writing. XD**

 **Anyway, that's it, guys. I'm happy that the last chapter of this story came out nice. It was honestly fun writing this story, and I hope you enjoyed reading too. So… yeah, it's the end. I'll see you in another story.**

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 **Ha! Gotcha!**

 **Just kidding, there's more! I'm not ending this here, NOT HERE!**

 **Thank you for reading anyway and I'll see you guys again soon.**

 **Bye!**


	11. Chapter 11

**Hello again! It's been a short while since I last updated, right?**

…

 **By "short while" I meant a full period of 3 months, that is.**

…

…

 **But ANYWAY!**

 **I'm finally back with the new chapter, so let's jump in right away.**

 **Enjoy!**

* * *

 **Chapter 11: Freedom, reunion and happiness**

A little girl cried softly as a woman gently stroked her hair, comforting her daughter as she herself could barely hold back tears. The man sitting next to them glanced at the dim light which was barely shining through the metal bars at the small window. It was another ordinary day for the family. Actually, they couldn't really tell if it was an early morning or a late afternoon, because they had been in the cell for too long to even care anymore. All they wanted was just to get out of this dull dungeon, but could they even think of getting out? Those cruel people… They had held them and the others captivated ever since their kingdom lost in a war… It had been… months? Years? Who knows…? Not to mention that many had been killed… The little girl continued crying, wondering how much longer they have to live, the mother just kept answering "I don't know" and the father just sat there, shaking his head in silence.

Hopeless, helpless and tired were what they all felt.

Suddenly, there was a click at the cell door. It wasn't really loud, but it was because of the eternal silence in this place that made them all jump in pure surprise. They all looked up and saw a guard walking in.

The man immediately shot up and covered his family as the other two held each other tightly. "What do you want?! You can chop off my head, but leave my wife and my daughter alone!"

"Sir, please stay calm." The guard reassured the man. "I'm not here to hurt you."

"Then what other purpose do you even have?!" Not believing the guard, the man shouted again. "Every time we hear you guards unlocking the door, that means you just take someone out to kill or at least torture!"

"No, it's not the same today." The guard maintained a calm voice as he tried to talk to the angered man. "I'm here to give you freedom."

"F- Freedom…?" The woman asked softly, but not loosening up her grip around the little girl.

"Yes, freedom. There has just been a sudden order from the King to release all prisoners from Redstone Kingdom this morning." The guard looked at the family. Judging by the unsure gaze and the silence, he could tell that they were still not really convinced, so he spoke up again. "Just take a look outside."

The man signaled his family to stay put and walked to the door. Once he was at the door, he took a look outside.

Indeed, there were a lot of people who were being released at that very same time.

* * *

Rise and shine! It was another good and fine morning at Boom Kingdom. Ellegaard slowly reached out her hand and silenced the alarm after it went off. She didn't really want to get up, partly because of her warm bed while the weather was pretty chilly outside. But it was mainly because of this… sensation she was feeling. It was very warm and tingling at the same time, so a part of her couldn't really stay still.

Warm and tingling sensation…

Oh, that's right… It was from last night… The night when she and Magnus finally confessed to each other and their heart became one. Ellegaard held her head, not believing that it actually happened. It really did. They were officially together as a couple now. It all happened so fast but oh so passionate that it seemed to be stuck in her head…

She sat up and stretched her arms while letting out a yawn. When she cleared her head was also when she finally noticed the noises from outside. Standing on her knees, she pushed the curtain aside, letting the warm sunlight entered the room and taking a look outside. There were unusually a lot of people, like, a thousand, or even a million of them!

Confused, she looked at the calendar on her nightstand. Hmm… it wasn't Magnus's birthday, or a festival, or a ball... (yes, every maid's calendar is marked where the important days are, including the king's birthday.) Today was just an ordinary day, then what was so important that there were tons of people here-

Wait…

Ellegaard suddenly remembered what Magnus promised her last night…

* * *

"Are all of them out?"

"Yes, a total 189,547 of them are all released, Your Majesty."

"Did you check if any criminal from our kingdom was accidentally released or tried to blend in to escape?"

"No, Your Majesty. We have checked twice carefully."

"Good, now lead them to any land that is empty and is close to where our citizens are living. And remind them to get paperwork to legally live here as a citizen."

"Understood, Your Majesty."

When Ellegaard finally reached the place, she was breathless. Trying to get change as quick as possible and then ran down six floors was surely exhausting for anybody, even for a marathon runner. Trying to catch her breath, she looked at the people in the crowd and couldn't help but smile brightly. Every of her beloved citizen… they all looked so happy as they walked beside one another, enjoying the fresh air that they hadn't had a chance to feel for such a long time. After so many days in the dark dungeon, they were finally out, ready to start a new life in the newfound freedom. The bright sky told her that they would surely be happy living a new life here.

Finally regaining her strength, she slowly approached Magnus, who were watching the crowd and the guards organizing it. She gently held his arm as she looked up with a smile.

"You kept your promise…"

"Of course I did, Ellegaard." He looked down at her, returning her smile. "Breaking a promise is always a shame to me, especially when it's a promise with a beautiful girl like you."

"T… Thank you…" She muttered quietly. "Thank you so much… Honestly, I feel so happy just looking at them being so cheerful…"

"I'll do anything if it means making you happy, because you make me happy, Ellegaard. I want to do something to show my appreciation for what you did for me."

She felt like she could cry again like last night at any moment. The amount of happiness was really too much for her. But she managed to hold back the tears and just admired the scene in front of her.

From the crowd, as a little girl held her mother hand's tightly, she looked to her left and her eyes lit up as she saw Ellegaard standing not too far away. She gently shook her mother's hand and shouted, pointing at Ellegaard's direction.

"Mom! Mom! Look! It's Princess Ellegaard!"

"What nonsense are you talking about? Stay quiet and keep goi-" The mother scolded, but went speechless as she saw Ellegaard. "O- Oh my god… Is- is it really Her Highness?!"

"Her Highness?!" Another woman asked with surprise. "But she-"

"It's Her Highness! Princess Ellegaard!"

"She's alright!"

Words after words, they spread across the crowd and all of them now looked at Ellegaard, shouting words expressing their relief that she was okay. She really was speechless, both with surprise and happiness. She was always told that her people cared for her, but only now did she get to actually experience what it meant. She was at the brink of crying again.

"Be quiet!" The guard shouted as he saw that some people were trying to run toward Ellegaard.

"It's fine." Magnus said. "Let them be with Ellegaard for a while. She was their princess after all, and they have been locked in for months."

The guard stayed silence in disbelief, but didn't dare to go against the order so he let the people ran toward their princess. Overwhelmed with emotions, Ellegaard couldn't help it but ran toward them as well, hugging as well being hugged by thousands of people. Almost every one of them was crying uncontrollably, including Ellegaard herself. After so many months of being separated, they were finally able to see each other again in bright sunlight.

Tears were shed and happiness was shared…

* * *

As they talked cheerfully and asked about each other, a man caught sight of Magnus standing from afar, smiling.

The man fused his eyebrows as he glared at Magnus for a while…


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12: A morning to love and think**

Another day arrived at Boom Kingdom, starting with the warm, soft sunlight while the cold, chilly weather filled the air. The dewdrops on the leaves and flowers glowed brightly like beautiful gemstones as the light shone on them. The little birds let out their beautiful voice and the butterflies danced along with the song. In the village, you could already see farmers going out to take care of their crops and factory workers walking to their workplaces, as well as any other citizens in the kingdom. A morning had started out well and nicely just like that.

It was the same as the castle. Everyone woke up early to start their work, just like a particular brown-haired servant. The sunlight shone through her room's window and the chilly wind made the curtain flow gently. The alarm clock went off, disturbing her beauty sleep. She let out a tiny groan as she reached her hand out and slammed the clock, silencing it. Just like many time before, she really had no motivation to wake up because her bed was so warm, especially in a cold weather like this. But she forced herself to get up, and she did just that.

Slowly pushing herself up from her comfy bed, she stretched out her arms to start off her morning. It was a very beautiful morning, she said to herself as she looked outside and smiled, feeling the soft glow of the sun gently hitting her face. After finished doing her daily hygiene activities, she walked over her closet to change into her iconic maid outfit.

Well, time to start another day of work…

… except, a bit differently this time…

… because she wasn't expecting her closet to turned into… _this._

Completely caught off guard, she stood there in surprise and… amazement. It seemed like her closet got a make over without her knowledge. Still stunned, she slowly took out a dress and admired it in aw. It was similar to her previous outfit, but it had so much more to it. The dress was still mainly in black, but it now reached the floor, unlike her previous dress that just extended to her middle forelegs. The bottom part of the dress was actually bigger and wider. Its sleeves wrapped around her arms more tightly and more perfectly, and it had long white cuffs. Her pinafore apron still had a pocket, but its bottom part was rectangular, not round and frilled. The shoulder straps of the apron were frillier and the top part had beautiful golden patterns along the rim.

After putting on her headpiece and tying the bow on her back, she stood in front of the mirror and twirled around. Since the bottom part of the dress was bigger, it made the dress flowed wider and her twirl so much more elegant. She watched as the dress slummed down as she stopped and smiled. This new outfit is so nice and beautiful, it actually looked like a royal dress. It really made her feel like… a princess once again.

A princess… like she used to be…

…

'Okay okay, no need to get emotional now, Ellegaard.' She shook herself slightly as she told herself. 'Everything has been better now, and this new outfit is very nice, but _where the heck did it come from?_ '

She thought to herself about it for a short while. She was genuinely confused. No one had ever mentioned about making a gift for her, or had been close to her to the point that they'd left a surprise for her. Well, there was Olivia and Jesse, but she didn't really think they would have that much time to make all these dresses for her.

…

Wait.

Something just clicked in her mind.

It… couldn't have been _him,_ right?

* * *

Chirp chirp… The little birds outside happily sang a song, waking up a man sleeping in the room nearby. He slowly fluttered his eyes open, bringing up one hand to rub them. It honestly wasn't the best feeling. He couldn't believe it was morning already. He stayed up until, like, three in the morning last night, so he really needed some sleep right now.

Oh well, guess he had to get up anyway. Schedule means schedule.

Suddenly, there was exactly three knocks on the door, and he knew exactly who it was.

"Come in, Ellegaard."

The door swung open, and came in his beautiful servant with his breakfast in her hand. As she walked in, his eyes seemed to be stuck on her new look. She looked _gorgeous._

He waited until she had locked the doors until speaking up, a smirk was seen on his face.

"It fits you so perfectly."

"So it was you, eh?" She let out a little chuckle as she put his breakfast on the nightstand, exactly what she had repeated a thousand times without him telling her to. "You really left me speechless this morning, you know."

"I know." He chuckled. "I have to admit, I'm pretty good at making it a surprise. I mean, you absolutely had no idea until now, right?"

"I… guess." She rolled her eyes, crossing her arms as she titled her hip a little bit to the side. "What I really want to know is, where did you get me this? I doubt you made it yourself."

"Of course not. Do I look like I'm good at sewing?" He let out a small laugh before continuing. "I had someone draw out the design, and a the tailors made all nine dresses according to it."

"Did they… get suspicious?" She trailed out in an unsure way. "Like, did they question why you want those outfits made?"

"Well, no. No one dares question orders from King Magnus!" He held up his fist and exclaimed in a joking way, before chuckling to himself. "But seriously, no, they didn't ask a thing. I don't even think they're willing to question me anything."

She chuckled as well. "Thanks a lot, but… you don't really need to do this. I'm fine with wearing my old outfit... you know. I'm fine with whatever outfit, actually."

Neither of them said anything and she fiddled with her fingers. It suddenly got really quiet, and she waited for him to say something to break the silence. For many times, it was her who made things real awkward, and she hated herself for it. She really did. Magnus said nothing and did nothing, except staring at her for a pretty short while. She really didn't know why, but his gaze got her every time. His eyes were always so beautiful and bright, and the way he looked at her so deeply was just… indescribably romantic.

"We've been in this romantic relationship for quite a long time now, Ellegaard."

He eventually spoke up, breaking the silence. As he said it, he gently held her hand and pulled her closer to him. She did nothing to resist, and quietly followed as she sat at the edge of the bed. He held her shoulder and hand as he continued.

"You're my partner and personal servant, so I want to… do something for you."

She giggled. "That sounds real sappy, don't you think."

"It is, but that's honestly how I feel." He looked away for a short while. "I want to make you look and feel special in some way."

"Well, I guess you did." She held up her hand and rubbed her chin. "Now I totally stand out among all the maids here. I… don't really hate it, actually."

"That's good to hear then." He smiled, and she returned it with one. "Listen, I may act cold to you around others, but just understand that I don't want them to get suspicious and give you unwanted attention. I genuinely care for you, so don't be afraid to talk to me about anything!"

"I will, Magnus. I will." She reached up and gave him a kiss on the cheek. "You should probably eat your breakfast and get ready soon. We have a lot of things to do today."

With that said, she stood up from the bed and walked to the door. As she opened it, she gave him one last smile before walking out, closing the door behind her. He still sat there in silence, keeping his eyes at where she last was, and a smile was seen on his face.

Chirp chirp… there they went again, singing a happy and upbeat tune to start off the morning. Unconsciously, the king rose from his bed and slowly walked toward the windows. With a swift move, he swung open the windows, letting the fresh and cool air enter. He then saw the little singers on the branch very nearby as they joined each other's tune. He rested his arms on the windowsills, admiring the beautiful sights of the birds and the entire kingdom before his eyes.

These birds had been here for a very long time now, and he absolutely adored them. They were his friends during his "dark time", when the war just ended and he locked himself in his room for who knows how long. He couldn't believe it. He refused to look at the reality before him. He just couldn't accept that all his loved ones were… gone. They were gone forever, every one of them. It was too much for him to handle with his fragile and young mind. Until one day, while he was still weeping all alone, he heard it… a very small but beautiful sound. That was when he finally took all his courage and opened the windows. It was like life was brought into the room once again, and the chilly wind hit his teary eyes. He looked around and he found them, singing together happily. He could also see the beautiful landscape right before his very eyes. The birds had always sung and the view of the kingdom had always been there, but he had never realized how beautiful they were. Seeing people helping each other rebuild their home was a pretty sight to see.

As he looked closer, he saw something unfamiliar. Upon closer inspection, it turned out to be… a nest! It was a bird nest that he'd never seen before, so they must have made it without him noticing. He could see a bird sitting inside a nest with another bird standing right next to it, gently bumping their heads together. They looked so happy together.

Happy together…

His mind was suddenly turned toward Ellegaard. He wondered if… it was fate that brought him and Ellegaard together. All of this seemed so unreal, but they all happened. They once lived so far away, and each had their own kingdom to take care of. Before the war started, he'd sometimes heard about the "princess from Redstone Kingdom", but never had a chance to actually meet her. But here they were, living together in the same place.

Honestly, fate or not, he was genuinely happy that she came into his life. He appreciated the birds' effort of cheering him up everyday, but it wasn't enough. There was still something missing that he couldn't find out, until the night when she appeared in his dream and the day they finally met, face to face. Well, it wasn't really pleasant when the first place they met was the dungeon with her being locked up. When seeing her in the cell, face full of pain, he was seriously hurt on the inside, because he had experienced it, he knew the pain of losing your family so suddenly. And he regretted it, he regretted causing her even more pain. He was selfish and forced her to be his personal servant when she was still trying to take everything in. When he was in pain, at least he still had others to support him. But unlike him, she was all alone and had to deal with all of it all by herself.

At first, he actually was kind of frustrated because she didn't understand how he felt. She was always mad at him mainly because she lost her family, but he lost his, too! He always wished she could finally understand his feelings one day. But on the rainy day when she stood on the bridge and poured all her heart out to him, he finally realized something. It was _him_ who didn't understand her feelings. To actually think about it, he regretted not realizing it sooner. Losing your loved ones _and_ being forced to serve an enemy must be a huge loss and shame for her. Her people were looking out to her and yet she was made to turn her back to them, pretending that she knew nothing. He couldn't believe he had actually caused her so much pain without noticing one bit. That was when he finally learned not to be selfish. He learned to take her feeling into account and to be more understanding toward her. He learned that loving someone isn't claiming her as his own, it was about making her happy and enjoy their time together. He learned that her happiness was all what important.

Despite all that, he couldn't help but admired her beauty everyday. His eyes couldn't resist. Each morning when she came to bring him his breakfast, he'd look closely at how beautiful and soft her step is as her dress swayed along. Her skin looked so soft, her hair was smooth and silky, and her eyes were as bright as a million stars. Even when she was forced to become a servant, she still had that elegant posture of a royal princess and on her face was a very romantic and alluring sadness. Needless to say, he was in love with everything she had, although it sounded… messed up. He had to admit that he was like a psychopath who wanted to keep a beauty to all to himself, so that he could enjoy her beautiful sorrow.

But believe it or not, he managed to make it work for both of them. Around other people, they still looked like they were strangers. Everyone still thought she was just a mere prisoner who got lucky and stayed here just to be given orders everyday. But no one knew. No one knew that her position was the complete opposite when she and Magnus were alone. She was the king's dearest partner, who spent every early morning and late night together with him, when they were sure not to be disturbed. Honestly, she looked even more gorgeous when she was happy, when she had that beautiful smile on her face, when she gave him, and only him, that endearing and loving gaze whenever they stared into each other's eyes in a soothing silence. Oh, how he adored those moments. She was the most precious to him, even more precious than the rarest gemstone, and he promised himself to make her happy everyday, so that he could return her passionate love like a good partner should.

He took a glance at the bird nest. He could see the mother was carefully taking care of her eggs, waiting patiently until the day they hatched. Then, they'd finally make a happy family.

A family…

He had lost a family, but maybe it wasn't too late to start a new one?


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13: The Order**

"That's settled. You can leave now."

"B- But Your Majesty-"

"Say how much you'd like, Axel, but I'm _not_ changing my mind."

The stern voices of two men really startled Ellegaard and made her stop in her track as she was walking past the double doors. Slowing turning her head, she looked at the doors as she raised her eyebrow. Ever since she started living here, she had overheard conversations from a lot of people a million times already, and she was used to ignore them, because they were small chats most of the time. But this one wasn't, apparently. Their voices sounded so serious that it was scary, like one of them was bounded to snap if things went too far.

It was even scarier when she recognized Magnus's voice coming from inside his office.

She wasn't the kind to enjoy eavesdropping, since she felt wrong sticking her face in other people's business. But she was curious, so curious about what made her King so mad. Slowing peaking from the crack between the doors, she could see Magnus sitting at his desk with his assistant Axel standing in front. The assistant seemed to be in big trouble, scratching his head and fidgeting with his paper rolls constantly, while the King had one hand on his head as he rested his elbow on the desk with a troubled expression.

She got startled and almost let out a gasp, which would have resulted in her exposing herself, when she caught the look in his eyes. It was filled with anger, _pure_ anger, frustation, and many other unpleasant things. She had seen him got angry before, but it was still nothing like this. Sure, he always looked scary when he was mad, but she always seemed to know what the reason was - it was stress most of the times - and she always managed to figure out how to calm him down. But this time was different. She absolutely couldn't understand what the reason behind this, and the look on his face made her unable to think properly. It was almost _terrifying,_ in a way, like the look he gave someone who dared hurt his citizens or be… "overly friendly" with his one and only lover.

They had been together for almost four years now, and she had never seen him so frustrated like this.

"Y- Your Majesty-!" Axel was stumbling on his words while trying his best to be respectful. "Y- You can't be serious-"

"I am, Axel, and I'll forever keep this choice."

"B- B- But as a King, you c- can't forever remain unwe-"

" _Axel."_

Magnus stared him dead in the eyes, making him shut up all at once.

"I've made my decision, and I'm _sure_ of it. You're _forbidden_ from questioning about it ever again. _Have I made myself clear?_ "

Axel gulped as sweats ran down his face like a waterfall. He looked like he wanted to say something, but he was afraid he'd die if he even tried to talk about it.

"U- Under- Understood, Your M- Majesty…"

"Good." Magnus turned away from him, returning his attention to his book. "Now go. I have some work to do, and I'd like some privacy."

"Y- Yes, Your Majesty."

Axel just simply nodded as he proceeded to head to the doors, although he seemed to hesitate for a few seconds. Ellegaard realized she was going to get caught eavesdropping if she didn't do anything fast, so she tried to quietly but quickly rushed to the end of the hallway and pretended to still be walking down the halls. She succeeded, thanks to the lessons on how to walk fast but gracefully that she took before as a princess. When Axel opened the doors and saw her, he did not show any suspicion on his face, so she guessed it worked.

"O- Oh, good afternoon, Ellegaard."

"Good afternoon, Axel." Ellegaard tried to keep a calm voice, pretending like she didn't hear about the conversation. "What are you up to?"

"J- Just the usual, Ellegaard. I- uh, just had a s- small talk with His Majesty, but it was n- nothing important."

Axel was stuttering so much that even if she hadn't overheard them, she'd have still immediately known that something was wrong. This was her perfect chance, so she asked as she walked up to him.

"You seem… troubled, Axel." She was in front of him now, and she looked firmly at him as she spoke. "Is something the matter?"

It hit Axel hard, and he stuttered even more. "L- Like I- I s- said, i- it's n- nothing w- worth telling, r- really!"

Ellegaard raised an eyebrow at him. "You… sure about that? You really look like something bad just happened to you…"

He didn't try to protest this time and stayed silent as he averted his gaze, biting his lips.

"Is it about what you just discussed with His Majest-"

" _No no no!_ L- Like I said, it's-"

"Axel, I don't like seeing you troubled like this." Ellegaard cut him off. "Please, tell me, Axel. I promise that you can trust me with this. Does this have anything to do with His Majesty?"

He didn't say anything, though he slowly nodded his head. Once.

"Come on, Axel, you don't need to hide anything from me." Ellegaard said. "We're both faithful servants to King Magnus, so if I don't know what's wrong, how can I take care of him well, or at least know how to act so that he wouldn't get irritated?"

Axel kept averting his gaze until he turned back to her, whispering as he leaned closer to her.

"O- Okay, I guess I can tell you about it. His Majesty seems to trust you a lot too, so promise me not to tell this to anyone, alright?" He waited for her to nod before continuing. "Let's go somewhere else. If he hears me gossiping to you about this, he will kill me _for sure._ "

* * *

"W- W- _What?!"_

Ellegaard couldn't help but let out a loud gasp as Axel gestured his hands, signaling her to quiet down.

"H- Hey, you might want to keep your voice down, or else someone will notice us." He said. "Well, it's pretty safe talking here, in my room. But still, I'd rather be careful."

"S- Sorry, I just-" She couldn't properly form a sentence while still being so shocked. "I expected King Magnus to give you some kind of weird order, but I- I didn't expect him to- to _do that!_

"Yeah, your reaction is exactly the same as mine when I heard him say that." Axel scratched his head.

"L- Let me get this straight." Ellegaard tried to collect her words. "His Majesty wants you to reject _every single marriage arrangement_ that comes up."

"Yep, every one of them, regardless of who it came from, even if it's the wealthiest family in this kingdom, or the most powerful kingdom in this world. I must reject them all, and that's his order."

"Oh my god…" Ellegaard covered her mouth while trying to calm down. "I really can't blame you for looking so shocked when you were finished talking to him."

"Honestly, I'm very worried…" Axel sighed. "I mean, it doesn't look like he's romantically interested in someone, and he never bothers to go look for love. So if he wants me to reject all marriage arrangement, then it's very likely that he wants to remain unwedded."

Axel let out another sigh in frustration as he pinched the bridge of his nose. "I would be totally okay with it if he were just a normal citizen or servant. _But_ he's the King of this kingdom, _for god's sake,_ _and_ he has no he doesn't get married, he's never going to have an heir! And when he's old, who's going to take the throne?!"

"W- Well…" Ellegaard fidgeted with her fingers. "There's always an option to… adopt, or choose someone else to be the heir?"

"Well, yes, but he has told me before that he wants his _blood_ child to take the throne in the future." Axel said, pausing for a while before continuing. "And even if he changes his mind and chooses to adopt, it'll be pretty inconvenient and difficult. If the heir isn't related to the royal family by blood, then they _must_ be smart, quick-witted, kind and considerate, just like a true ruler should be. If we are to adopt, then we must think of some kind of exams or tests to see if they meet those expectations. This is a very, _very_ rare case, and no generation in this kingdom has done it before, so I doubt anyone is prepared enough for this, let alone comes up with something good."

He rubbed his temples. "To tell you the truth… I've always had the highest and most sincere respect for King Magnus ever since I started working for him ten years ago, I really have. But… I just _wish_ that I could, for once, _truly_ understand what went on in his head, especially in such important moments like this."

Ellegaard was quiet the whole time, carefully listening to every word Axel had to say. When it seemed like he had completely expressed all his thoughts, silence washed over them until the maid decided to speak up.

"Have His Majesty… always been this way…?"

"Not really, actually." Axel crossed his arms, thinking to himself as he talked. "I know it's been a long time now, and that you've already been told about this, but… before the war, he used to always go to people he trusted to relieve his thoughts."

"Really?" Ellegaard asked so, but she knew it already. Since they got together, she had been the source of comfort for Magnus whenever he had something troublesome in his mind. And she had always been there for him, to listen to what he had in his mind. But she doubted that he'd be willing to talk to her about all this, about the order he had just given his assistant.

"Yeah, he was never afraid to talk about his thoughts and fears, and we always showed sympathy to him, because we all loved and respected him. But after the war, specifically after the previous King and Queen passed away, he became… distant, which pained us all greatly. When he decided to go out of his room and began to _speak_ after what seemed like forever, it was really a great leap of improvement, and we couldn't really ask for more. But I'd be lying if I said we didn't hope that he would return to his old self. Until now, we still miss the optimistic, cheerful and friendly spirit he used to have."

"It must have been sad, really…" Ellegaard mumbled quietly. "To see your beloved one change so drastically…"

"It was, but we're used to it now, and have decided to forget about it."

He paused to look up at the clock on the wall before speaking again in a surprised tone. "Oh, is it time already?"

She followed his gaze up at the clock and was surprised as well. The clock had just struck five, meaning that it was time to prepare dinner. To think that time passed by so quickly…

"Thanks for talking with me, Ellegaard." Axel smiled. "The order is supposed to be a secret, so His Majesty forbids me from revealing it to anyone. Because of that, I feel relieved after getting all of that off my chest."

"It's nothing, Axel." She returned his smile as she said, heading toward the door. "I have to go now. Olivia must be waiting for me at the kitchen."

"You know… you're such a nice person that I almost forgot that you used to be from the opposite side."

Right after he finished his sentence, silence rushed over the room.

"O- Oh, I'm t- terribly sorry!" He quickly spoke up once he realized what he had just said. "I shouldn't have mentioned your past like that!"

"It's really okay, Axel." She chuckled. "Just like you, I've decided to forget about it."

"Well, thanks again, Ellegaard. I really mean it."

* * *

"I think this is the last one for tonight." Olivia said as Ellegaard handed her a stack of dishes. "Thanks for your help, Ellegaard."

"How many times do you have to thank me, Olivia?" Ellegaard chuckled. "And how many times do I have to say that you don't need to? This is one of our daily chores, after all."

"Well, it doesn't hurt to say it, right?" Olivia smiled before she began washing the dishes. "I'll handle this. You should go now, Ellegaard."

"Are you sure you can do the rest, Olivia?"

"Of course." Olivia said. "Besides, you have to be with King Magnus to assist him whenever he needs until he's in bed, right?"

Oh, right.

"Then I'll be taking my leave now." Ellegaard said, about to turn her heels. "Goodnight, Olivia."

"Goodnight, Ellegaard."

As Ellegaard left the kitchen, she felt the tension returning to her body once everyone wasn't around anymore and once her mind was no longer occupied with work. When Magnus was at the dinner table, she noticed that his face was still tensed, even though it had been more than an hour since his talk with Axel. She didn't know why, but she felt very afraid to talk to him, even if she was his lover and one of the people he had willingly open up to and trusted the most.

And speaking of lover, she found it very surprising that they were _that_ good at keeping their romantic relationship a secret. Axel was Magnus's assistant, so that meant Axel had to spend a lot of time around him, which stunned Ellegaard greatly that Axel hadn't noticed or even suspected anything about it.

Well, while Ellegaard deeply appreciated that fact, it still really confused her. Even if Axel, or anyone, didn't know that it was Ellegaard, he must have _at least_ noticed that Magnus had had his eyes on someone. Did _no one_ really care about his love life at all?! Or was it just that Magnus was good at hiding his feelings, like it was simply one of his natures?

She was so busy pondering with her thoughts that she almost didn't realize that she had reached the said King's bedchamber. Normally, she'd be very happy to be here, because she could openly express her love and affection for him, to give him her goodnight kiss without the fear of being caught. But now, she felt hesitated to enter, as she found herself standing there motionlessly before she was able to push open the door.

Looking across the large room, she saw him sitting in his bed, reading a book like usual. He sure was always quite a bookworm, reading between work and even right before he went to bed. He looked very peaceful indulging himself in his book, seemingly less stressful than when he was having dinner, but she knew there must still be millions of thoughts running through his mind.

"Magnus…"

To think about it, it was quite funny, how in this room she called him by his name, but as soon as she stepped outside, she called him by his title of respect. Just through a pair of doors, but it made such a drastic difference.

"Do you need help with anything?" She asked.

It took him a while to find his answer. "I'm fine like this. No need to assist me with anything."

He was trying his best to hide his inner thoughts, she could tell. But pressing him any further would be a pretty bad idea, judging how he was struggling with his feelings already, so she decided to leave him be.

"If so, then I'll be taking my leave now. Goodnight, Magnus."

She proceeded to open the door, but before her hand could touch its chilly surface, his voice rang quietly throughout the room.

"Wait…"

She turned her head to see that he was looking away, eyes looking down the mattress with his book placed on his leg.

"Actually… come here, Ellegaard."

Huh, so he eventually decided that he needed her anyway.

Walking toward him with each careful and slow step, she noticed that he was avoiding her gaze the whole time, but she didn't mind it. She understood how difficult it was to look straight at your partner when you were trying to hide something from them. Sitting down next to him, she asked quietly.

"What is it, Magnus?"

He didn't answer. Instead, he leaned forward and wrapped his arms around her from behind. It elicited a small yelp from her as her heart skipped a beat from the sudden action. Turning her head a little, she saw that he had rested his forehead on her back as he kept him embrace tight around her.

"Tired?"

She asked, and he only let out a small "Yes" which was muffled.

"Can we… stay like this for a while?"

"… Of course."

That was the last words spoken before silence washed over them. It wasn't uncomfortable or awkward, but warm and peaceful. There had been nights like this when Magnus just couldn't hold it in and silently decided to find his lover for comfort, so this wasn't something new for Ellegaard. For the whole day, he must have been so stressed about his decision that it drained his energy, unable to do anything properly.

She sighed as she brought up her hand to place them on his, which was wrapped around her hip.

'Magnus, are you that devoted to me that you want to keep every woman away from our relationship and give out such a drastic order?'

She thought as she silently sat there, letting him fall asleep.


End file.
